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INDIAN SKETCHES 



PERE MARQUETTE 

AND 

THE LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE 
CHIEFS 



BY 

CORNELIA STEKETEE HULST 



LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 

FOURTH AVENUE b- 30TH STREET, NEW YORK 

LONDON, BOMBAY AND CALCUTTA 

I9I2 



E99 



Copyright, 1912, by 
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. 




CCI.A320624 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

Foreword v 

I. The Mission of P^re Marquette . . i 

II. The Last of the Pottawatomie Chiefs 40 

III. Chief Simon Pokagon 78 



FOREWORD 

This little volume of sketches has been prepared 
witb the purpose of supplying children, and such of 
their elders as know nothing of these matters, with 
some of the most beautiful and heroic stories from 
the material for a history of the Northwest Terri- 
tory. It is constructed on the theory that a history for 
children should make biography prominent, along with 
picturesque and social features, but that discussions 
and deductions fit for mature minds are not desir- 
able in children's books. With a choice of presenting 
too much or too little of the available material, I have 
tried to send readers a little hungry from the feast 
rather than with an uneasy sense that they have had 
too much, and want no more of Indian history. 

In anticipation of the probable criticism that these 
pictures of Indian life are not only too romantic, but 
too rosy, I can only say that Marquette, Petit, Catlin, 
and many other observers who knew the Indians as 
friends, saw them so. Examining these witnesses as 
to their credibility, we must conclude that they are 
not inferior in quality, but far above the ordinary 
pioneer or business man, for they were all of unusual 
intelligence, culture, and independence of character; 
they had no axes to grind, and were free to shake the 
dust from their feet and move on if they did not find 
the field profitable and to their liking. 

But excellent as the evidence by friendly observers 
is as to the good side of Indian character, it is still 
inferior to that obtained from the writings of Chief 



vi FOREWORD 

Pokagon, Dr. Eastman, and other Indians who have 
written, or whose speeches have been preserved. The 
depths of the Indian nature were not revealed even to 
a sympathetic observer, for the reason that the Indian 
is habitually reserved in speech. ''The Queen of the 
Woods" by Pokagon and "The Soul of the Indian" 
by Dr. Eastman are informed by high and pure ideas 
and ideals, which a superficial contact with white men 
and their learning could not have hastily evolved, and 
which explain hard places in the narratives of the 
travellers. It is time, in the name of truth and justice, 
that the best sides of the Indian character should be 
known, and that prejudice should not continue to do 
the races wrong. That many of the Indians have de- 
teriorated, and gone down under hard modern con- 
ditions, does not change the facts of their original 
character, or of the possibilities of their gifted race. 

Foremost among us, C. H. Engle, Esq., of Hart- 
ford, Michigan, who assisted the Indians free of 
charge in securing their legal rights, and the Honor- 
able Daniel McDonald of Plymouth, Indiana, should 
be honored as true friends of the Indians. Mr. Engle 
helped Chief Simon Pokagon publish his writings and 
collect back pay for his tribe; and Judge McDonald 
persuaded his State's legislature to raise the monu- 
ment to Menominee. To these should be added Carter 
Harrison, Mayor of Chicago during the World's Co- 
lumbian Exposition, who invited Pokagon to take 
part in the celebration on "Chicago Day." 

This little book is dedicated to them, and to all 
who have done their part to make us understand that 
the red man and the white man are brothers. 

In preparing these chapters on events and persons 
largely obscured, I have received most generous help 
from those who know the sources. An acknowledg- 
ment is a very inadequate expression for my gratitude. 
Valuable suggestions and contributions of material 



FOREWORD vii 

have come from the Rev. Daniel E. Hudson of Notre 
Dame University, Mr. George A. Baker of South 
Bend, Indiana, and M. G. Van Schelven of Holland, 
Michigan. The material collected by Mr. C. H. Engle 
of Hartford, Michigan, and the Hon. Daniel McDon- 
ald of Plymouth, Indiana, was placed at my disposal. 
Much that is of first value was contributed by Mrs. H. 
H. Hayes of Chicago, and to her I am indebted also 
for my happy and profitable relation with Mrs. Nelly 
Kinzie Gordon, now of Savannah, Georgia, the grand- 
daughter of John Kinzie. Facts of value also have 
been contributed by Mr. J. P. Dunn, President of the 
Public Library Commission of Indiana, and by Miss 
Caroline M. Mcllvaine, Librarian of the Chicago His- 
torical Society. 

Acknowledgment is also due to Messrs. D. Appleton 
& Co., for cuts of bronze reliefs by Herman A. Mc- 
Neil in the Marquette Building, Chicago, as follows: 
Joliet and Marquette Departing from St. Ignace, The 
Meeting with the Illinois, Attacked by the Mitchi- 
gamea, The Death of Marquette, and Burial of Mar- 
quette at St. Ignace; to Lorado Taft, Esq., for the 
portrait of his statue of Black Hawk; to the Chicago 
Historical Society for the photograph of the Hon. 
Fernando Jones; and to Catlin's American Indians, 
from which material for the colored frontispiece and 
the pen-and-ink drawings were made. 

Finally, this volume of Indian Sketches goes forth 
with special greetings to the members of the Ameri- 
can Library Association, who met at Mackinaw, for 
to their interest and kindness it owes its existence. 
Cornelia Steketee Hulst. 

Grand Rapids, Michigan, July, 19 12. 



INDIAN SKETCHES 



INDIAN SKETCHES 

CHAPTER I. 

THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE. 

The first white man who sailed his "great canoe 
with paddles" into Gitche Gumee, the Big-Sea-Water 
(Lake Superior), was a French trader, Jean Nicolet, 
who set foot upon the soil of Saulte-de-Ste. Marie in 
1634, and a little later passed the straits of Mackinaw 
into Michi-gum (Monstrous Lake). He was followed 
soon by missionary priests from France, who started 
missions at the Soo and the Pointe of Lake Superior: 

From the farthest realms of morning 
Came the Black-Robe Chief, the Pale-face, 
With the cross upon his bosom, 
Landed on the sandy margin. 

The greatest of these Black-Robes to carry his gos- 
pel into the farthest Lake Region and the northern 
Mississippi Valley, and to reach the hearts of the In- 
dian people, was James Marquette, Pere Marquette, to 
use the name that he taus^ht the children of the forest 



2 INDIAN SKETCHES 

to call him, for he came as a father among them to 
teach them his Christian faith. In 1668-9 he preached 
at La Pointe and helped to build a mission at the Soo ; 
then he founded new missions at Mackinaw and St. 
Ignace ; and finally he went with a trader, Joliet, into 
the region of Green Bay, across Wisconsin, to the end 
of Lake Michigan, and down the Mississippi River, 
in the first white party to cover this course. 

Now it happened that in those years the Indians of 
the Lake region were in sore need of friends and 
counsel, for the times were troubled and destruction 
threatened them. In 1649 ^ lo^g" war of extermina- 
tion had been ended in Canada, in which the Iroquois 
were victorious, and had killed by torture, if not in 
battle, all of their enemies, the Hurons, and along 
with them the devoted missionary priests who were 
living among them. Fifteen missions were burned 
down and their priests put to death or mutilated in that 
savage campaign. But the missions of France were 
only extended because of it — for again the blood of 
the martyrs proved the seed of the church — and the 
next priests who volunteered to carry on the missions 
in this most dangerous field were heroes, like Mar- 
quette, who came expecting to die a martyr's death. 
Their devotion in the face of such danger appealed 
to the Indian warriors as teaching alone had not done. 

The Hurons had been friendly listeners to the 
Christian teachings before they met their defeat, but 
not converts; now the little bands of them who es- 
caped from the Iroquois and fled into the Lake Region 
were turning Christian, and wherever they went 






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4 INDIAN SKETCHES 

among the friendly Algonquin tribes, in the settle- 
ments that they made at the Soo, La Pointe, Mack- 
inaw, St. Ignace and Green Bay, missions were estab- 
lished and supported by some of them. They roamed 
from tribe to tribe, long distances, even down into 
Illinois, and wherever they went was told the tale of 
their terrible war, and of the devoted Black-Robes of 
the missions, who had come to live among them to 
teach them the truths of the Great Spirit and the 
Hereafter, and who had been true to them through 
death by fire. There were rumors that the terrible 
Iroquois were about to pursue the Hurons and con- 
quer the tribes of the West, and also rumors of en- 
croachments and wars by cruel pale-faced English and 
Spanish invaders at the East and the South, so the 
tribes at the West were doubly eager to welcome the 
Black-Robe who came as a friend and to accept the 
alliance that he offered them with his Great Chief, the 
King of France. 

His Christian and political missions were proud, but 
personally the mission priest of those days was a very 
humble man, and a man of peace. He lived among 
the Indians as a brother who is to spend the rest of 
his life with them; he shared their food, even if it 
was coarse and dirty; he rejoiced with them in their 
joys and sorrowed with them in their sorrows, as the 
wise instructions of his religious order advised him 
to do when he dedicated himself to his work. When 
he travelled with them in a boat he took a hand at 
the paddle and helped transport lading at the port- 
age; he was careful not to carry sand or water into 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 5 

the canoe, as he was Hkely to do unless he Hfted the 
skirt of his long robe; to avoid cutting off their view 
with the broad brim of his hat, he laid his beaver aside 
and wore his tight-fitting nightcap instead. He did 
kindly little services on the way, lighting the fires with 
his flint and steel, for the Indian way of making a fire, 
by rubbing two sticks together was hard and slow. 
He helped supply the food, buying fish from the tribes 
they passed with some of the beads and fishhooks that 
he always carried among his stores, knowing how 
highly the Indians prized such articles. If they were 
without food, he, too, went hungry, sometimes for 
three or four days (this often happened among the 
tribes of the north, when game was scarce). If they 
had only moss from the rocks, he shared it with them ; 
if their food was powdered fishbone, that was what 
he ate. 

The priests of the mission were counselled to be 
polite and considerate of the feelings of the Indian 
people, to visit them in their cabins, to bear their 
faults in silence, to praise the exploits of their young 
men and hunters, to pay respect to the old people, to 
be sympathetic with those in trouble, and to honor 
the dead ; but also, on the right occasions, to be gay 
and affable, to caress the children, to show no impa- 
tience if they screamed and wept, and to be not too 
long in saying prayers. Doubtless Marquette was po- 
lite to his people, for he was greatly loved and hon- 
ored among them. 

The Island of Mackinaw, where Marquette estab- 
lished his mission of Michilimackinac, and his mis- 



6 INDIAN SKETCHES 

sion at St. Ignace, which he located on the mainland 
opposite, were directly in the way of all of the Indians 
who journeyed to the north, the south, the east, or the 
west by water; and there he met Indians of many 
tribes and mastered six Indian languages while he did 
his mission work. There, too, he heard much of the 
land and the waters at the west, Michi-giim, that lay 
before him, and the Missi-scpi, the great river, that 
rolled beyond. Gradually this all prepared him for the 
long journey that he was soon to make into the un- 
discovered country, and the travellers whom he had 
talked with prepared the tribes to receive him, by tell- 
ing on their return of his little log Mission, his 
Chapel, and the counsel he offered. 

It was on May 17, 1673, that Marquette embarked 
at St. Ignace with the Sieur Joliet and five French 
Voyageurs on their famous voyage. The little mis- 
sion looked down that day upon a picturesque assem- 
blage as they said farewell, the brave and beloved 
young priest in long black robes and broad black hat, 
the strong young trader Joliet in beaver and gay 
blanket coat, the sturdy Voyageurs in gray homespun, 
with bright sashes and pudding-bag caps, the natives 
in skin garments with ornaments of wampum, beads, 
and feathers. A very different scene it was to be 
when they brought their priest back to his mission. 

From St. Ignace the party followed the right shore 
of Lake Michigan west and south, speaking often of 
the beauty of the scenes. They stopped first at Green 
Bay to visit the Menomonees, a tribe named from the 
wild rice that grew bountifully in the rich mud bot- 




■^"n 



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TT^Y 2. 



lM fit . 



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m MumHinS* 



A PORTION OF PERE MARQUETTE'S MAP 
From Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, Thwaites. 
Courtesy of the Burrows Brothers Co., Publishers, Cleveland, O. 



8 INDIAN SKETCHES 

toms and swamps and was gathered by the women for 
food. The explorers were well entertained here and 
were urged to remain, for the reason that the journey 
south would be full of danger. Marquette says, in 
his "Relation": 'They represented to me that I would 
meet nations who never show mercy to Strangers, but 
Break their Heads without any cause; and that war 
was kindled Between Various peoples who dwelt upon 
our Route, which exposed us to the further manifest 
danger of being killed by the bands of Warriors who 
are ever in the Field. They also said that the great 
River was very dangerous, when one does not know 
the difficult Places; that it w^as full of horrible mon- 
sters, which devoured men and Canoes Together ; that 
there was even a demon, who was heard from a great 
distance, who barred the w-ay, and sw^allowed up all 
who ventured to approach him; Finally that the Heat 
was so excessive In those countries that it would In- 
evitably Cause Our Death." 

This noisy demon that would devour both men and 
canoes was perhaps a waterfall in the river, for the 
Indians personified all of the powers of nature. He 
scoffed at the power of the demons, and waterfall 
or demon could not turn the missionary from his pur- 
pose, and he told the friendly Menomonees that be- 
cause the salvation of souls depended upon his going, 
he should be happy to give his life if that were re- 
quired of him. After giving them religious instruction 
and making them pray to God, he parted from them 
and proceeded on his journey. His devotion and cour- 
age must have greatly inclined his hearers to his faith. 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 9 

At De Pere, in Green Bay, the party reached the 
Mission of St. Francis Xavier and enjoyed a visit by 
the way among friends and Christians, for Father 
Allouez, Marquette's predecessor at La Pointe, had 
established a Mission there and from it had gone out 
to preach to the neighboring tribes, Foxes, Miamis, 
Menomonees, Winnebagoes, and north-wandering 
bands of the IlHnois. Many had been persuaded to 
his Christian faith. 

Along Lake Winnebago the party wended its way to 
the Indian village located where Oshkosh is now built, 
and thence to a large village with superior Indians, 
united Mascoutens, Miamis and Kickapoos, some of 
whom had migrated to the West from Virginia and 
Ohio. Here he found to his great satisfaction and 
encouragement that many were devout Christians. In 
the middle of their village stood a handsome Cross, 
adorned with many white skins, red belts, bows and 
arrows, all offerings which these people had made to 
the Great Manitou, as they called God. They were 
very friendly to Marquette and Joliet^ and, after en- 
tertaining them, conducted them in a great crowd back 
to their canoes, a distance of about four miles. They 
were not able to express enough their admiration at 
the sight of seven Frenchmen, alone and in two canoes, 
daring to undertake so strange and dangerous a jour- 
ney. They furnished two Miamis to go with the party 
and serve as guides, and amid love and enthusiasm 
sent the little party upon its way. 

W^hen the party had followed the river as far as 
they could, they crossed a portage and reembarked on 




lO 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 1 1 

a river flowing to the west, called the Weskonsing, 
now the Wisconsin, and this they followed in its 
course down to the Missi-sepi, or Great-River, at a 
point where the Father of Waters has a broad and 
sweeping current, a mile across and fifty-three feet 
deep. They gazed upon the great flood of waters with 
rapture, ''A joy that I cannot express," writes Mar- 
quette in the Relation. 

The voyage was now continuously successful, but 
not without dangers, though the party did not en- 
counter the mythical monsters prophesied by the Me- 
nomonees. One very real source of danger was the 
monstrous sturgeons, which they struck from time to 
time with such violence that they thought at first they 
had run upon a great tree and were about to break 
the canoe to pieces. 

Daily the boatmen landed and supplied the party 
with game and fish. Near what is now called Rock 
Island, at 41° 28' north, they found wild turkeys, and 
great herds of buffaloes roamed the plains, one that 
Marquette estimated at four hundred. Always they 
took wise precautions when they landed, and they 
maintained a strict guard, for they were afraid that 
they might be surprised by the hostile bands of Indians 
that they had heard of. Toward evening they made a 
small fire on land to cook their meals, and after supper 
they moved as far away from it as possible and passed 
the night in their canoes, while they anchored in the 
river at some distance from the shore. 

The happiest incident in Marquette's journey was 
his stay with the Illinois Indians, a proud tribe whose 



12 INDIAN SKETCHES 

name in their own language meant ''the men," as if 
all others were mere beasts as compared with them. 
They were really superior in many ways. The French 
party had seen no men from the loth of June, when 
they left the Maskoutens, until the 25th, when below 
a rocky coast, at the water's edge, they saw the tracks 
of men and a narrow, somewhat beaten path through 
fine prairies. They thought that this must be a road 
leading to a village, and resolved to reconnoitre it. 

Marquette and Joliet alone undertook the investi- 
gation, which they felt to be a hazardous one. Rec- 
ommending themselves to God with all their hearts, 
and having implored His help, silently they followed 
the narrow path. After w^alking about two leagues 
they heard voices and saw a village before them. Now 
they halted, and without advancing shouted with all 
their energy. The Indians swarmed out, excited, and 
having no reason to distrust two men w-ho made their 
coming known in this open way, and, perhaps, seeing 
the Black-Robe, of whom the Hurons and their travel- 
lers had told them, deputed four of their old men to 
meet them. Two of these bore in their hands tobacco 
pipes finely ornamented and adorned with various 
feathers, and all walked slowly^ the pipes being raised 
to the sun as if offered to it to be smoked. They spoke 
no word, and preserved the greatest dignity. 
.. These pipes which the old men carried were calu- 
mets, or Pipes of Peace, and Marquette would not re- 
ject them, though they were connected with the re- 
ligion of a pagan tribe, for, like Paul on Mars Hill, 
he made use of the old religion to teach the new. At 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 13 

the door of the Lodge in which they were to be re- 
ceived, stood an old man, who awaited them with his 
hands stretched out and raised toward the sun, as if 
he wished to screen himself from its rays, which, 
nevertheless, passed through his fingers to his face. 
When the guests had approached near him, he spoke : 

''How beautiful is the sun, O Frenchmen, when you 
come to visit us ! All our town awaits thee, and thou 
shalt enter all our cabins in peace." 

He then took them into his cabin, where there was 
a crowd of people, who devoured the strangers with 
their eyes, but kept a profound silence, except occa- 
sionally, when they addressed a few words to the visi- 
tors in a friendly way, as, ''Well done, brothers, to 
visit us!" 

As soon as the guests were seated, they were pre- 
sented with a calumet, which a visitor must not refuse 
unless he would pass for an enemy, or at least for being 
impolite. Now all of the old men smoked in honor 
of the visitors, and soon messengers came from the 
Grand Sachem of all the Illinois to invite them to pro- 
ceed to his town, where he wished to hold a Council 
with them. 

They paid a visit to the Grand Sachem, attended by 
a good retinue, for all of the people, who had never 
seen a Frenchman, could not see enough of them. To 
look at them the better, some threw themselves on the 
grass by the wayside, while others ran ahead and then 
turned and walked back to see them again. All of 
this was done without rudeness or noise, and with 
marks of great respect for the guests. 




< s 



14 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 15 

Between two old men, the Grand Sachem stood at 
his lodge's door to receive his guests, all three with 
their calumets held toward the sun. He welcomed 
them with friendly words, and then presented them 
his calumet and made them smoke it. 

Now Marquette addressed the Sachem, presenting 
him four gifts. With the first, he said that he 
marched in peace to visit the nations on the river to 
the sea; with the second, he declared that God, their 
Creator, had pity on them, and that it was for them 
to acknowledge and obey Him; with the third, that 
the Great Chief of the French informed them that he 
spread peace everywhere, and had overcome the Iro- 
quois, the enemy of the nations ; and with the fourth, 
he begged information of the sea and of the nations 
that must be passed to reach it. 

When this speech was finished, the Sachem rose, 
and, laying his hand on the head of a little slave, 
whom he was about to give his guest, he spoke thus : 

'T thank thee, Black-Gown, and thee. Frenchman, 
for taking so much pains to come and visit us. Never 
has the earth been so lovely, nor the sun so bright, 
as to-day; never has our river been so calm, or so 
free from rocks, for your canoes have removed them 
as they passed ; never has our tobacco had so fine a 
flavor, nor our corn appeared so beautiful as we behold 
it to-day. Here is my son, whom I give thee that thou 
mayest know my heart. I pray thee to take pity on 
me and all my nation. Thou knowest the Great Spirit 
who has made us all, thou speakest to Him and hear- 
est His word ; ask thou Him to give me life and health. 



i6 INDIAN SKETCHES 

and come and dwell among us, that we may know 
Him." 

Saying this, he gavie his guests the little slave, and 
then made them a second present, the calumet of 
Peace, than which there was nothing more mysterious 
and more esteemed among them. Also he, like the 
Menomonees, urged his new friends, on behalf of his 
whole nation, not to proceed farther and expose them- 
selves to the great dangers that would meet them 
among hostile tribes; and to him also Marquette re- 
plied that he should esteem it the greatest happiness to 
lose his life for the glory of Him who made us all. 
And the Sachem could only wonder at his reply. 

It was Marquette who first introduced into his own 
language (from which it was introduced into ours) 
the Indian word calumet, and he remarked that a mys- 
tery attaches to it, and that men do not pay to the 
crowns and sceptres of kings such honor as the In- 
dians pay to the calumet, for among them it seems 
to be the god of peace and war, the arbiter of life and 
death. If a man carried it about and showed it, he 
could march fearlessly amid enemies, for even in the 
heat of battle warriors laid down their arms when it 
was shown. 

There was a calumet of peace, adorned with feath- 
ers of the white eagle, and a calumet of war, adorned 
with red feathers. The bowl of this pipe was of red 
sandstone, like marble, so pierced that one part held 
the tobacco and another was fastened to a stem two 
feet long, which was ornamented with large feathers 
of red, green and other colors, and with the head and 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 17 




i8 INDIAN SKETCHES 

neck of birds of beautiful plumage. Even the spot 
where the stone was obtained was regarded as sacred, 
and the pipe was held among all of the tribes as a 
sacred symbol of brotherhood among men. In the 
Pipestone Quarry, in Dakotah, no war-club or scalp- 
ing-knife was raised, for at the top of its precipice 
of red rock, overlooking the sacred valley, the Great 
Manitou stood when he called the nations together. 
From this rock he broke a fragment, and when he had 
fashioned it in his hands, he smoked it, to the north, 
to the south, to the east, and to the west of the holy 
valley, telling men that this stone was red, as a symbol 
of their flesh, and that they must use it for their pipes 
of peace and keep the peace in this valley. On the 
rocky summit of these hills the thunder-bird, whose 
mate is a serpent, hatches the storms. Here over the 
crest of the red precipitous rock the storm is sublime, 
but peace broods in the valley, and there the warriors 
of all of the nations assembled in peace, to gather frag- 
ments of the fallen stone and fashion them into calu- 
mets, which they smoked at solemn festivals and at 
the sacred dance. 

Marcjuette tells that the Indians regarded the calu- 
met as belonging to the sun particularly. They pre- 
sented it to him to smoke when they wanted to obtain a 
change of weather, and they did not bathe at the be- 
ginning of summer or eat the new fruits of the sea- 
son until they had danced the calumet dance in honor 
of the sun. This sacred ceremony was for only great 
occasions, to strengthen peace, or to declare war, to 
honor some important person or some invited guest, or 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 19 

to make public supplication or rejoicing. The Mystery 
Men, who were both the healers and priests of the 
tribe, used it in incantations. 

The sacred Calumet Dance, or Sun Dance, was held 
by the Illinois Indians in honor of their guest, Pere 
Marquette. The scene that the Black-Robe beheld 
can be clearly imagined from the account that he wrote 
for his Order in his Relations. 

Large, colored mats made of rushes were spread 
in the shade of large trees in a grove, to serve as a 
carpet, and each warrior set up on one of these his 
Manitou — a snake, a bird, some animal, or other ob- 
ject of which he had dreamed in his sleep and now 
thought as his special protector. In this he put his 
trust for success in the hunt, in fishing, or war. Near 
his Manitou, and at its right, he placed his calumet, 
in honor of which the feast was given, and spread his 
weapons around it — his warclub, his tomahawk, his 
quiver, bow and arrows. 

When all had been arranged and the hour for the 
dance had arrived, chosen singers took their places 
in the shade of the trees. They were the selected 
men and women who had the best voices, and who 
sang in perfect accord. The spectators then came 
and took the inferior places, each as he arrived salut- 
ing the Manitou by inhaling smoke and then puffing 
it forth from his mouth upon it, offering smoke as an 
incense. Each, as he went, first took the calumet rev- 
erently in both hands and danced with it in a cadence, 
suiting himself to the air of the song and moving the 
pipe in various figures, sometimes displaying it to the 



20 



INDIAN SKETCHES 




CHIEF, WITH CALUMET. MANITOU, AND WEAPONS 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 21 

whole assembly, sometimes turning it from side to 
side. 

After this, the one who was to begin the dance ap- 
peared in the midst and danced alone. Sometimes 
he held the pipe toward the sun, as if offering the 
smoke; sometimes he inclined it to the earth; some- 
times he spread its feathers as if for it to fly; some- 
times he offered it to the spectators for them to smoke. 
All of this was in cadence, and this was the first scene 
of the dance. 

The second scene was a combat, to the sound of a sort 
of drum, which accompanied the song and harmonized 
quite well. The dancer beckoned to some warrior to 
pick up the weapons on the mat, and challenged him 
to a combat. The other approached, took up the bow 
and arrows, and began a struggle with the dancer, 
who had no defence but the calumet. This scene was 
very pleasing, especially as it was done wdth the 
rhythm of the dance. As the one attacked, the other 
defended; as the one struck out, the other parried; as 
the one fled, the other pursued, until finally he who had 
fled turned about and faced his foe with the sacred 
symbol, and put him to flight. This was all done so 
well, with measured steps and the harmony of voices 
and drums, that the distinguished guest thought it 
equalled in beauty the opening of a ballet in France. 
The third scene consisted of a recital by the holder 
of the calumet, of the battles he had fought and the 
victories he had w^on, naming the hostile' nation, and 
the foe. When the recital was finished, the Chief who 
presided presented the warrior with a gift, a beauti- 



^2 INDIAN SKETCHES 

ful beaver robe, or some other precious thing, which 
was received with thanks. The calumet was then 
passed to another, who in turn recited his exploits and 
passed the pipe on, and so all in turn took a part. 
When the recitals were finished, the Chief who pre- 
sided presented the calumet to the honored guest, in 
token that an eternal peace should be kept between him 
and the tribe. 

In Marquette's opinion, the singing of the chorus 
had expression and grace, but could not be easily rep- 
resented in the notes of the musical scale of Europe. 

After the Council and the smoking of the calu- 
met at the Dance, by which the Chief Sachem of the 
Illinois honored Marquette, a banquet was given, at 
which the French guests were offered with ceremony 
dishes of Indian corn, of fish, dog-flesh, and the meat 
of the buffalo. 

The corn was esteemed among the Indians as a kind 
of divine grain, a special gift of the Great Spirit, and 
in the Algonquin language they called it Mon-da-min, 
the Spirit's grain, for they believed that the first stalk 
of corn came down from the sky in full tassel as an 
answer to the prayer of a young hero at the end of his 
manhood's fast. This gift was so needful to man that 
every year when the harvest of corn was ripe a 
Thanksgiving Feast was held, at which the tribe held 
its sacred Dance of the Corn, one of the most beauti- 
ful Indian dances. When the ears were well grown, 
the women, who raised it in their garden plots, did 
not open the husk and look for themselves to see 
whether it was ripe enough, but each morning at sun- 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 23 




MYSTERY MAN 



rise they picked several ears and carried them to the 
wise Mystery Man in the Council House for his judg- 
ment; and when at last he judged them ripe for the 
Feast of the Corn, he sent criers forth to announce 
throughout the village and tribe that the day was set 



24 INDIAN SKETCHES 

and all must prepare by fasts for the approaching eere- 
mony. 

On the day appointed a framework, or bower, was 
made, of four poles ornamented with ears and stalks 
of corn — four was the sacred number. Under this 
bower a fire was built, and over the fire a kettle hung-, 
suspended from the crossing of the poles, and filled 
with the first green corn, that was to be sacrificed to 
the Great Spirit. While the water was boiling, four 
Mystery-Men, their bodies painted white, and each 
bearing a stalk of corn in one hand and a she-shc-quoi, 
or mystic rattle in the other, danced around the pot 
singing songs of thanksgiving; and a circle of chosen 
warriors, also wdth stalks of corn in their hands, 
danced in an extended circle outside, singing the Song 
of Thanksgiving. The rest of the tribe were specta- 
tors. 

Now, while the dancing continued, wooden bowls 
with horn spoons were laid out on the ground, from 
which the people were to feast. When the Mystery 
Men decided that the corn was sufficiently boiled, the 
dancing and singing were stopped, the kettle was taken 
down, the ears were removed and were laid on a 
little framework of sticks built over the fire. Then 
the dance was begun again while the corn was being 
consumed. When nothing but ashes remained, these 
were sacrificed to the Great Spirit. The fire itself was 
removed, and the ashes were buried, so that no 
creature should use them. 

And now a new fire was started, to boil the corn for 
the tribe, on the very spot where the old one had been. 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 25 




26 INDIAN SKETCHES 

and with painful exertion, for they knew no way but 
by friction. Three men took seats on the ground fac- 
ing each other, and they labored hard, drilling the end 
of a stick into a hard block of wood. One rolled it 
between his hands until he was tired, when the next 
caught it from him and rolled it, without allowing the 
motion to stop, until the third relieved him, to be re- 
lieved in turn by the first. And so the rolling went 
on, until smoke appeared, and at last a spark was 
caught in a piece of punk. When this spark of new 
fire was seen, there was great rejoicing, and they blew 
it into a flame to boil the next kettle of corn, of which 
they would partake. 

The first to partake of the feast were the Chiefs, 
the Mystery Men^ and the warriors; and then the 
whole tribe were served. For a week or ten days the 
feasting continued, until the fields were exhausted or 
the ears had become too hard to be eaten after this 
fashion. There was no merrier time in the year than 
the Feast of the Corn and Thanksgiving. 

The offer of corn was an honor, but the serving of 
dog-flesh was regarded as an even higher honor in 
the Indian lodge, for the dog is valued more among 
Indian tribes than among civilized men, and if this 
faithful companion is sacrificed, it is to assure the 
friend, ''We give you our hearts in this feast — we 
have killed our faithful dogs to feed you — and the 
Great Spirit will seal our friendship." Perhaps Pere 
Marquette did not understand the spirit in which this 
was offered, or perhaps he thought that this was flesh 
that had been offered to idols — he explained to his host 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 27 




m^ 



28 INDIAN SKETCHES 

that he did not eat dog flesh, and the dish was with- 
drawn. 

Even common people wanted to give the visitor 
gifts, as he walked through the village, and that night 
he slept in the lodge of the Chief. The next day, 
when he took his leave, nearly six hundred persons 
conducted him to his canoe, showing in every way 
that they could how much pleasure his visit had given 
them. He made them a promise that he would return 
in four moons, and then said his farewell. 

The islands and rocky shores, the prairies lying in- 
land, the large village in the midst of rich fields, about 
five or six miles from the Mississippi, all mark this 
landing as near Rock Island. The village that Mar- 
quette entered was like that near the fork of the 
river, in which Black Hawk was to be born in 1767, 
and from which his tribe was to be driven forth at 
the end of the war that bears his name, never to return 
to the land of their fathers. What a contrast between 
this arrival and that departure! Without a shadow of 
right, squatters had taken possession of Bladk Hawk's 
rich prairies, fenced in the Indian fields, beaten the 
Indian women and children who returned to cultivate 
their land, burned their canoes and wigwams, and 
driven the plow through the graves of their dead. It 
was on the anniversary of the landing of Marquette 
that the Governor of Illinois called out the troops, not 
to protect that tribe of Indians in their rights, but to 
expel them from their land. Our best historians call 
this "a, black chapter in the history of the West ;" it is 
doubly black against the background of Marquette's 



THE MISSION OF FERE MARQUETTE 29 




STATUE IN COMMEMORATION OF BLACK HAWK 
Overlooking Rock River, Illinois 



30 INDIAN SKETCHES 

visit. Now our histories are giving this de- 
feated Chief the honor that is due him. Our great 
American sculptor, Lorado Taft, has also moved our 
sympathy by his heroic statue in commemoration of 
Chief Black Hawk, who looks out with Indian dignity 
and grim restraint over the valley of Rock River, the 
home of his people, and the battleground of their final 
defeat. 

When the French party again took their boats, they 
sailed again toward the south on the Mississippi. 
They had not gone far when they passed a rocky coast, 
where two alarming monsters had been painted on the 
high and long rocks. These startled even the French, 
and the boldest Indian did not dare to gaze long upon 
them. ''They are as large as a calf," wrote Marquette : 
''they have horns on their heads like those of a deer, a 
horrible look, red eyes, a beard Like a tiger's, a face 
somewhat like a man's, a body Covered with scales, 
and so Long a tail that it winds all around the Body, 
passing above the head and going back between the 
legs, ending in a Fish's tail. Green, red, and black 
are the three colors composing the picture." It must 
have taken great courage to go on, expecting to meet 
such beasts in the flesh. Fortunately, they were only 
of the artist's imagining, and the explorers did not 
encounter any of them. At the mouth of the Missouri 
River dangerous masses of fallen trees and other 
floating refuse sweep into the Mississippi from its 
great tributary, amid which their little boats could not 
keep their course and came near to being upset, but 
finally they passed south in safety. 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 31 

Near the mouth of the Ohio they passed a part of 
the shore much dreaded by the Indians because they 
think that an evil Manitou Hves there, who devours all 
travellers. This monster turned out to be a small bay 
full of dangerous rocks, some of them twenty feet 
high, where the current of the river is whirled about, 
hurled back against that which follows, and then 
checked by a neighboring island, where the mass of 
water is forced through a narrow channel with a furi- 
ous commotion, a rising tide, and a great uproar. 
This was just such a place as that off from the Sicilian 
shore, where the Greeks feared Scylla and Charybdis, 
and where Odysseus was in danger of being wrecked. 

Soon a very great and real peril threatened Mar- 
quette's party in the persons of hostile Indians armed 
with guns. Here was a test of their courage. Mar- 
quette rose from his seat in the canoe, and raised aloft 
before him the mystic Indian symbol that the Illinois 
Indians had given him — the calumet. It quieted the 
excitement instantly, and the Indians invited the 
Frenchmen ashore, ''as much frightened as we were," 
remarks the brave narrator, too truthful to pretend that 
he had not known fear. These Indians had come into 
at least indirect contact with white men, as their guns 
showed, and also their hatchets, hoes, knives, beads, 
and glass powder flasks filled with powder. They 
were frightened because they had heard of the cruelty 
of the Spanish explorers and took this party for Span- 
iards in quest of riches. 

The Arkansas Indians were more actively hostile, 
and the party barely escaped death. Armed warriors 



32 INDIAN SKETCHES 

plunged into the water and approached Marquette's 
canoes with battle cries. Some of the young braves 
embarked in great wooden canoes and hurled clubs 
at the Frenchmen, while others swam out into the 
river, evidently intending to upset them. Those who 
remained on the shore kept coming and going ex- 
citedly, as if about to begin an attack. Again Mar- 
cjuette rose in his canoe and held forth the calumet 
that the sachem of the Illinois had given him, but this 
time the talisman seemed to fail of efifect. The alarm 
continued, and the young braves seemed about to dis- 
charge their arrows, "when God suddenly touched 
the hearts of two old men at the waterside," doubt- 
less at the sight of the calumet, and they succeeded 
at last in quieting the younger men. Two of the 
chiefs now jumped into the explorer's canoes and 
brought them to shore, where the party landed, though 
still anxious for their safety. The next day ten of 
the men of this tribe in a canoe guided them on their 
way farther down the stream, and introduced them to 
the next tribe, who lived opposite the mouth of the 
Arkansas River. Here they were welcomed with civil 
w^ords and were given a banquet, at which corn, dog- 
flesh, and watermelons were offered them, and at which 
they were entertained with speeches and dancing. To 
the speeches they responded, Marquette teaching the 
Christian religion and Joliet talking of alliance with 
his king and New France. The guests offered gifts to 
the Indians, as usual, and this led to a new peril, for 
on the following night some of the natives tried to 
murder the travellers. The chief put a stop to the 







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34 INDIAN SKETCHES 

plots, and presented his own calumet to the visitors 
as a pledge of his protection. 

The exploring party now d^ted whether they 
should not turn back upon their;.' way, and resolved 
to do so, satisfied that they now knew the course of 
the river and that the results of their voyage would 
probably be lost if they went fafther, through their 
being taken captive by Spaniar-4i*©r killed by a hostile 
tribe. They retraced their cours^e, until they reached 
the mouth of the Illinois RivefT^Here Marquette left 
the Mississippi to cut short his cqjjrse by ascending the 
Illinois and descending a strearrTon the other side of 
the portage, that carried him into Lake Michigan at 
the southern end. Here also, as at his first visit to the 
Illinois, he was welcomed by most friendly chiefs and 
tribes, and he taught them his religion, leaving them 
with a promise to return. 

At the end of September, having travelled 2,767 
miles, the exploring party reached Green Bay. Joliet 
passed on, but Marquette remained at the mission 
among friends to regain his health, for he was wasted 
by his illness. His recovery was slow. 

Marquette remembered his promise to return to the 
Illinois Indians, but illness kept him at Green Bay 
through the following summer, and November had 
come before he was well enough to set out. Then 
two French boatmen accompanied him, and in a 
month rowed him down the western shore of Lake 
Michigan and into the river that led to the Illinois. 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 35 

Winter came upon him and his illness grew worse 
before he had reached their village. His little party 
spent the winter in a poor cabin that offered no com- 
forts. As soon as navigation was free in the spring, 
they set forth again, and Marquette was soon among 
his loving friends in Illinois, welcomed, to use his 
words, ''as an angel from heaven." At Easter time 
he held a great service for them, where five hundred 
chiefs and old men were seated around him, and fif- 
teen hundred younger men, besides the women and 
children, stood in the audience to hear his message. 
First he presented them gifts of wampum to attest his 
earnestness and the importance of his mission, then 
he explained the principal mysteries of his religion 
and his reasons for coming to their country. They 
listened to him with universal joy, and again begged 
him to return to them, since he said he could not 
stay. This time w^hen he left them, they escorted him 
with pomp and with every mark of friendship more 
than thirty leagues upon his way. 

His strength had now failed so that he had to be 
carried, but he continued to be cheerful and gentle, 
and encouraged his beloved companions to suffer all 
of the hardships that they had to endure with patience. 
The season was stormy, and again and again they had 
to wait in the land-sheltered harbors of the St. Joseph, 
the Kalamazoo, the Grand, and the Muskegon rivers 
for the waves to subside before they could continue 
their journey. 

Feeling that death was near, Marquette finally se- 
lected a spot of rising ground near what is now the 




36 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 37 

city of Ludington. There he was carried ashore, and 
with the greatest cahnness made his preparations for 
death. He gave thanks to God that he had been a 
missionary of Christ, and, above all, that he was dying 
— as he had prayed he might — in a wretched cabin, 
in the midst of the forest, and bereft of all human 
succor. His boatmen listened to him as to one inspired 
and went about the business of the camp in tears. 
Their account tells that his countenance beamed and 
was all aglow as he awaited death. 

The next spring some of the Huron Indians whom 
Marquette had instructed in his mission at La Pointe 
heard of his death as they were returning from their 
hunt in northern Michigan, and sought the grave of 
this good father whom they had tenderly loved. Their 
reverent hands removed his remains from his forest 
grave and carried them back for burial to the little 
chapel that he had built at St. Ignace. Thirty canoes 
formed the funeral procession for nearly two hundred 
and fifty miles, and the scene that the little log mis- 
sion looked forth upon now must have been very im- 
pressive, as, in the presence of a multitude on the 
shore, the cortege approached the land. The priests 
were intoning a chant. The interment was within the 
church, which was later destroyed by fire and the site 
long forgotten. In 1877 it was discovered and hon- 
ored by the monument which marks it now. 

In the history of the spread of Christianity by mis- 
sions there is no more inspiring story than this of the 
devoted and heroic Marquette. His superior and 
friend wrote of him, "He always labored with much 




^ o 









38 



THE MISSION OF PERE MARQUETTE 39 

fatigue and great success at the conversion of the sav- 
ages in our most arduous missions among the Ottawas. 
He possessed all the virtues of a mission priest in a 
sovereign degree — universal zeal, angelic chastity, an 
incomparable kindness and sweetness, a childlike can- 
dor, a very close union with God." In France his 
family w^re of an ancient house and occupied posi- 
tions of honor, and he might have been a scholar, a 
courtier at the court of Louis XIV, or a soldier high 
in command, but he chose the humble life of con- 
stant danger and hardship in the wilderness, in order 
that he might teach the Christian faith to savage 
people. 

What a spirit that must have been that could win 
not only the gentler Algonquin tribes, but the savage 
Huron and Arkansas warriors to belief in his religion 
and to personal devotion ! It must continue to inspire 
future ages to high ideals, and courage, and self- 
sacrifice. 



CHAPTER 11. 

THE LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS. 

This is the forest primeval ; but where are the hearts that 

beneath it 
Leaped Hke the roe, when he hears in the woodland the 

voice of the huntsman? 

Scattered like dust and leaves, when the mighty blasts 

of October 
Seize them, and whirl them aloft, and sprinkle them far 

o'er the ocean. 
Naught but tradition remains. . . . 

— Longfellow. 

Among the wise and good Indians who should be 
honored along with the last of the Mohicans are Chief 
Pokagon, the last of the Pottawatomie chiefs of the 
Northwest Territory, and his dear personal friend, 
the sub-chief Menominee. During the first third of 
the nineteenth century their tribe still held the vast re- 
gion that encircles the lower half of Lake Michigan, 
and their w-arriors ranged freely over the prairies or 
through the forests in the chase. 

Pokagon I and his people were among the foremost 
Indians in development and power. His village was 
in the St. Joseph Valley, near Niles, in Michigan, at 
the spot now called Bertrand, but named by the French 

40 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 41 

in an early period Pare aiix J ^ aches, because it was a 
famous stamping-ground of the buffalo; Menominee's 
village was at Twin Lakes, Indiana, in the valley of 
the Kankakee. The two water systems were connected 
by a short portage. The valley of the St. Joseph, lying 
at the eastern turn of the great lake, as Evanston and 
Chicago lay at its western, was greatly enriched by 
its favored position, for dense herds of buffalo and 
other large game thronged across it when they rounded 
the lake in their spring and autumn migrations. This, 
along with the fact that the St. Joseph Valley was also 
the main land route taken by travellers going to the 
east, made it the chosen home of the head chief of the 
tribe, for it brought him into relation with outlying 
and distant parts. From Bertrand the trail led to 
De Charme's, now Ypsilanti (where a trading post 
was established early), and thence to Detroit. 

Pare aux Vaches was a spot of ideal beauty, and it 
offered creature comforts in abundance to the chil- 
dren of nature, almost without their labor. From 
the banks of the cool St. Joseph, giant white syca- 
mores still rise, that looked across the slender strip 
of wet meadows to a fringe of willow, blackthorn, 
papaw, sassafras, sumach and elder, and into dense 
forests of huge oaks and maples. Fields of wild rice 
everywhere followed the bed of the river and spread 
over the lowlands, free to the harvester, and the rich 
soil of the uplands yielded large returns in corn to 
those who cultivated the ground. Fish swarmed in 
the river, and myriad flocks of wild fowl floated on 
its surface. When the morning mists began to rise, 



42 INDIAN SKETCHES 

deer with their fawns were seen by the hunters on 
the banks, or an elk herd stood there wathin sight; 
when the sun was hot on the prairie, the buffalo cows 
swarmed with their calves over the bluff into the 
shaded valley, to crop the fragrant herbage of the 
bushes and drink the cool sweet water from the many 
deep springs that feed the river; and when evening 
approached hundreds of thousands of wild pigeons 
passed, in their season, to the nesting trees. In the 
Moon of Wild Geese the whole Pottawatomie tribe 
held its encampment there, to celebrate the Feast of 
Ripe Corn and apportion the land for the winter 
hunt. 

For a long while it was thought that the St. Joseph 
Valley w^ould always be a great commercial centre, and 
when traders and mission priests first came to the 
West they settled there earlier than at Chicago. So, 
in 1800, John Kinzie, the first great trader and pioneer 
of Chicago, had had his posts at Bertrand and in the 
Kankakee before he established a house at Chicago and 
brought his family there. The kindliness and justice 
of this able man must have been a large factor in win- 
ning the chiefs of those valleys to their policy of peace 
with the oncoming whites, as well as to that personal 
good will and devotion that later rescued him and his 
family from massacre when Fort Dearborn was at- 
tacked. An even stronger factor, in an earlier time, 
was the consecrated priest of the French mission, who 
lived among them as a father with his children. 

Local historians, who have gone carefully over the 
ground, contend that Pere Marquette visited this val- 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 43 

ley on his last voyage, following the common water- 
course taken by travellers, up the Kankakee River, 
across the portage to the St. Joseph, and thence to the 
lake. Whether or not this view be adopted, it is cer- 
tain that Pere Allouez, his great contemporary, estab- 
lished a French mission in the valley of the St. Joseph, 
and lies buried near its shores. In the period follow- 
ing, the Indians of these villages were so won to Chris- 
tianity that they remained Christian after the missions 
had been abandoned and the priests withdrawn. 

Chief Pokagon, who was born in the St. Joseph 
Valley in 1775, was taught the Christian faith by his 
parents. Both he and Chief Menominee were deeply 
religious men, and, since they had no pastors now to 
teach their people, both undertook that work them- 
selves as far as they were able. Again and again Chief 
Pokagon appealed to the bishop of Detroit to send his 
people another Black Robe. ''What!" he exclaimed, 
"must we live and die in our ignorance? If thou hast 
no pity on us, take pity on our poor children, who will 
live as we have lived, in ignorance and vice." In 1829 
a priest was sent out to them, who baptized them all 
with Christian names, and became their teacher and 
advisor. Pokagon I was baptized as Leopold, and his 
young son as Simon, and their little chapel again be- 
came a centre of Christian teaching to the tribe, from 
which the priest went out to hold services in other vil- 
lages. Later the mission developed a school, and 
finally the University of Notre Dame grew out of 
that. 

Chief Pokagon held daily prayers in his family,, and 



44 INDIAN SKETCHES 

Chief Menominee preached sermons to his people. He 
proudly showed his visitors a stick on which he had 
cut notches to keep tally of the number he had deliv- 
ered — there were many notches on the stick, but he 
was eager that a preacher with greater knowledge and 
authority should live among them, and whenever a 
missionary happened to visit the tribe, the chief gave 
a most friendly welcome and an urgent invitation to 
remain. In 1821 a travelling Baptist missionary, the 
Rev. James McCoy, received such a welcome and in- 
vitation, but passed on after remaining with the tribe 
two days. The account he wrote of his visit at Twin 
Lakes is very much like Marquette's "Relation" in 
the impression it gives of the open-hearted and lov- 
able Indians of Illinois : 

''As we approached the village, Menominee and 
others met us with all the signs of joy and gladness 
which could have been expected from these poor crea- 
tures. Menominee immediately cried aloud to his peo- 
ple, informing them that their Father had arrived. I 
was no sooner seated, by their invitation, than men, 
women, and children came around and gave me their 
hand, even infants were brought that I might take 
them by the hand. A messenger was immediately 
despatched to a neighboring village to announce my 
arrival. In his absence, Menominee asked me if I 
had come to reside among them. Receiving evasive 
answers, he expressed great eoncern. He said the 
principal chief of their party and all the people of the 
village with few exceptions desired me to come. He 
showed me a place which he had selected for me to 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 45 

build a house upon. Their huts being exceedingly 
hot and unpleasant, I proposed taking a seat out of 
doors. The yard was immediately swept, and mats 
spread for me either to sit or lie upon. We were 
presently regaled with a bowl of boiled turtle's eggs; 
next came a bowl of sweetened water for us to drink." 

This was old Indian hospitality. 

In a short time the principal chief, who had been 
notified of the arrival, came from the neighboring 
village. McCoy spells his name in three ways, Pchccko) 
Poheeka, Poheeko, but it is evident from all of the 
facts that it was Pokagon I, who had been chief of 
high rank since 1800, who was a Christian, and who 
invited teachers of the Christian religion to come to 
preach to his people. Pokagon smoked with McCoy 
and the men of the village, and then he invited the 
guest to visit him in his lodge. This invitation McCoy 
accepted, and before he returned to Fort Wayne he 
went to visit Pokagon, accompanied by Menominee and 
some of the men of his village. There he found that 
the chief had hoisted the flag with stars and stripes 
over his lodge in loyalty to the United States, and as a 
compHment to his guest. 

After McCoy's sermon the Indians addressed him 
with these words: 

"Our father, we are glad to see you and have you 
among us. We are convinced that you come amongst 
us from motives of charity. We believe that you 
know what to tell us, and that you tell us the truth. 
We are glad to hear that you are coming amongst 
us to live near us, and when you shall have arrived, 



46 INDIAN SKETCHES 

we will visit your house often and hear you speak 
of these good things." 

When he said good-bye some of the Indians gave 
their visitor their benediction, and one of them said, 
*'May the Great Spirit preserve your energy and 
health, and conduct you safely to your family, give 
success to your labors, and bring you back to us 
again;" and when he left Twin Lakes, Menominee 
walked with him on his w^ay, begging a continuance 
of his friendship, declaring that, for his part, he would 
continue to serve God and do right. And so they 
parted. 

A little later a mission priest came to live with the 
tribe, uniting the people to the Roman Catholic con- 
gregation, and Menominee built him a log chapel at 
Twin Lakes. It was a pleasing little building, thirty 
by forty feet in dimensions, with the chapel on the 
ground floor. Separated from it by a hall-way was a 
small living room, and over the chapel there was a 
sleeping room, the ceiling of the chapel serving for the 
floor of this chamber. Here a hammock swung on 
ropes, and a primitive table and chair were the only 
furniture. Rudely made benches furnished the chapel, 
and a cross, erected behind it, rose above. The Indians 
did all of the work of building, with the axe as their 
only tool, leaving the bark on the logs and fasten- 
ing the parts together with strips of skin or bark, for 
they did not know the use of hammer, saw, or nails. 

In 1837 Father Petit took charge of this chapel 
and lived among the Indians, sharing their corn and 
meat, but drinking no alcoholic drink, so that he 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 47 

might be an example to them, for Hquor was the bane 
of the Indian race. He lived a busy life in his little 
log cabin, and a pleasant one, though he had few 
comforts and no luxuries. Daylight shone through 
many chinks in the walls. He had no carpet, and the 
boards of the floor were so loosely fastened that they 
yielded to the foot, "Like the keys of the piano to a 
musician's fingers," he said playfully, writing home. 
But the huge fireplace (it was large enough to contain 
a cord and a quarter of wood) kept the little room 
warm. Here every day at sunrise, w^hen the chapel 
bell pealed forth, you might see the savages moving 
along the paths of the forest and the borders of the 
lakes. When the congregation had assembled, the 
second peal was rung, and then the services were held. 
All day the doors of the Httle parsonage and chapel 
were open, and at sunset the congregation again as- 
sembled for the evening prayers and benediction. 

Father Petit won the hearts of the Indians, and 
their warmth of affection and simplicity delighted 
him. ''How I love these children of mine," he ex- 
claimed, ''and what pleasure it is for me to find myself 
amongst them! There are now from i,ooo to 1,200 
Christians. When I am travelling in the woods, if I 
perceive an Indian hut, or even an abandoned encamp- 
ment, I find my heart beat with joy. If I discover 
an Indian on my road, all my fatigue is forgotten, 
and, when their smiles greet me at a distance, I feel 
as if I were in the midst of my own family. . . . 
Could you see the little children, when I enter a cabin, 
crowding around me and climbing on my knees— the 



48 , INDIAN SKETCHES 

father and mother making the sign of the cross in 
pious recollection, and then coming with a confiding 
smile to shake hands with me — you could not but love 
them as I do." 

This is the way they wished him a happy New Year. 
On New Year's Eve he was asleep on his mat when 
a loud report of musketry awakened him. When he 
ran to the door, in rushed a troop of men, women and 
children, who knelt around him and begged his 
blessing for the New Year. After he had given them 
his benediction, they all came forward with happy 
smiles to shake hands with him. 'Tt was a happy 
family festival," he says. Alas! the circle was to 
be broken soon. Events had occurred in distant places 
in preceding years that were to change everything in 
their forest world. 

The history of the period between 1775 and 1838 
enables students of to-day to understand the next event 
in this Indian epic. 

When Pokagon I was a child and Menominee a 
young man, the thirteen colonies were fighting their 
revolutionary war with England, and when the treaty 
granting independence was signed at Paris the boun- 
dary of the United States was fixed on the west at the 
Mississippi River, on the north by Lake Superior and 
Lake Huron. The inhabitants of that vast territory 
were too far removed to know anything of the war, 
except by the vaguest rumor, and were never consulted 
in the matter. (They had made a treaty with Great 
Britain some years before, by which it was agreed 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 49 

that white settlers should be kept out of all the land 
north of the Ohio River; and now, when the United 
States claimed the territory north of the Ohio, east 
of the Mississippi, and south of the Great Lakes as 
their "Northwest Territory," according to the Treaty 
of Paris, the • Indians inhabiting it objected on the 
ground that the British had no right to their territory, 
and therefore could not give it away by treaty. There- 
fore, the Indians did not admit the right of the new 
government, and became actively hostile to it. In this 
they were encouraged by the British, who, contrary 
to the stipulations of the treaty, still held possession of 
the northern posts at Detroit and Mackinaw, and the 
surrounding territory. 

The President and Congress now appointed a com- 
mission to come to an agreement with the natives, 
and in 1784-86 the Shawnees and some of the eastern 
tribes acknowledged the rule of the United States, 
reserving ownership of tracts of their land; but the 
Pottawatomies and other western tribes made no 
treaty, and even the Shawnees later resumed hostili- 
ties against the oncoming whites, who were entering 
and settling upon their reservations without legal 
right. A border hostility between the two races grew 
out of the invasion and was now constantly kept up 
for many years. 

When the Ordinance of 1/8/" organized the vast 
tract that lay north of the Ohio, east of the Missis- 
sippi, west of New York,* and south of the Great 
Lakes into the ''Northwest Territory," it provided not 
only for protection of person and property, freedom 



.so 



INDIAN SKETCHES 




MAP OF THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY, 1787 



of religion, and education, but also for justice to the 
Indians. 

The following governmental document tells the tale : 
''The utiuost good faith shall ahmys be observed 
toward the Indians, their lands and property shall 
never be taken front them zvithoiit their consent; and 
in their property, rights, and liberty, they shall never 
be invaded or disturbed, unless in just and lawful 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 51 

zcars authorized by Congress; but lazvs founded in 
justice and humanity, shall, from time to time, be made 
for preventing urongs being done to them, and for 
preserving peace and friendship with them." 

In 1789 the western tribes, including the Pottawat- 
omies, Ottawas, Chippewas and Sioux, signed a treaty, 
by which they acknowledged the rule of the United 
States, reserved certain lands for their own use, and 
agreed to admit and protect traders ; but, if meant 
in good faith, these articles did not keep the peace, 
and the border struggle continued. The Wabash In- 
dians, who had not been bound by any treaty as yet, 
made constant raids into Kentucky, and the settlers 
retaliated — striking friendly tribes, along with foes, 
even those who had prided themselves on their attach- 
ment to the United States. Under Washington's wise 
guidance, Congress tried to conduct matters justly to 
both Indians and whites. In all of this irregular 
fighting, Washington judged that the forces of the 
United States would not be justified in attacking the 
Indians, for they were within their rights under the 
ordinance. 

In 1790 the Pottawatomies, Ottawas, and Chippe- 
was raised an objection that the Government had not 
paid them for their lands, and that, therefore, the 
sale which they had made could not be held valid, and 
petitioned for redress, asking again that the Ohio 
River be acknowledged as the ^'perpetual boun- 
dary to the Indian lands'' and that white settlers be 
kept out. War was now near at hand, and British 
agents were fanning the sparks of discontent into 



52 INDIAN SKETCHES 

flame by promising active assistance when war should 
come about. The first battles occurred the next year 
in Ohio, with results that were not decisive. Both 
sides claimed the victory. This, with the prospect 
of a more serious outbreak, convinced Washington 
of the need of a competent army to be called into 
action in case war broke out, therefore he appointed 
General Anthony Wayne to organize and drill the 
troops, but at the same time made a last effort to 
secure peace by a new council and a new treaty. 

The chiefs who met at Sandusky in this new coun- 
cil were addressed by the commissioners, and were 
assured that the great chief (General Washington) 
was anxious to keep peace wath them. But they re- 
plied, inflexibly: 

''Brothers, those treaties wxre not complete. There 
were but a few chiefs w^ho treated with you. You 
have not bought our lands. They belong to us. 

''Brothers, many years ago we all know that the 
Ohio was made the boundary. It was settled by Sir 
William Johnston. This side is ours. We look upon 
it as our property. 

"Brothers, you mentioned General Washington. He 
and you know that you have your houses and your 
people on our land. You say you cannot move them 
off. We cannot give up our land. 

"Brothers, we are sorry we cannot come to an 
agreement. The line has been fixed long ago. 

"Brothers, we don't say much. There has been 
much mischief on both sides. We came here upon 
peace, and thought you did the same." 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 53 

At this time a messenger from the provinces of 
Spain along- the Mississippi arrived and urged the 
tribes to begin war, promising not only to assist, but 
to lead in battle, saying : 

''Children, you see me on my feet, grasping the 
tomahawk to strike. We will strike together. I do 
not desire you to go before me, in the front, but to 
follow me. 

''Children, I present you with a war-pipe, which 
has been sent in all our names to the Musquakies,"- 
and to all those nations who live towards the setting 
sun, to get upon their feet and take hold of our toma- 
hawk ; and as soon as they smoked it they sent it back 
w^ith a promise to get immediately on their feet, and 
join us, and strike this enemy." 

War now followed, but the Spanish colonies and 
their allies did not lead, nor even come to the assist- 
ance of the Indians. The British were a bitter disap- 
pointment, too, for they took possession of a fort 
which they had built in the Indian territory under pre- 
tence of offering a refuge to the Indians in case of 
necessity, but now, when the time of need arrived, 
they occupied it themselves, shutting the Indians out. 
When the food supplies of the Indians were de- 
stroyed by General Wayne, and they became depend- 
ent upon British support^ the British did not half sup- 
ply them. Their cattle and dogs died, and they them- 
selves were starving. The decisive battle of the war 
gave victory to General Wayne, and in 1795 the In- 
dians all signed a treaty which was to bury the hatchet 
forever. They kept the right to hunt in their own 



54 INDIAN SKETCHES 

reservations, but accepted the government of the 
United States. 

Among the Pottawatomie chiefs, Pokagon I was 
second in rank in 1800, Topinabee being first; later 
Pokagon rose to the first. He must have taken part 
in the wars and councils of the preceding years, and 
now he certainly tried to keep the peace. After bury- 
ing the hatchet in 1795, when the Indians signed the 
Treaty of Greenville, Pokagon advised his people to be 
true to their allegiance and rely on peaceful means to 
right their wrongs — and wrongs and anxieties they 
had many, for white traders and squatters were con- 
stantly encroaching upon the land which the Indians 
owned, and the army posts and forts at Detroit, Fort 
Wayne, Mackinaw, and Chicago were a perpetual 
threat of force to be used against them. There was 
little in Indian history to assure them that they could 
keep their own, and so, when Chief Tecumseh and his 
brother, the Prophet, held out a hope of regaining their 
independence and establishing an Indian empire for the 
Algonquin tribes by exterminating the whites amongst 
them, many joined him. But Pokagon advised his 
tribe very strongly against the movement, for he saw 
that they ''might as well try to stay a cyclone in its 
course as beat back the on-marching hordes of civiliza- 
tion toward the setting sun." However, not able to 
hold them back, he was present with them during the 
attack on Fort Dearborn, in Chicago, when the garri- 
son was massacred in August,' 18 12. 

But for the chiefs of the St. Joseph Valley, the 
family of John Kinzie would not have escaped the 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 55 




MODEL OF FORT DEARBORN, CHICAGO 

massacre. Indian guards stood before his door while 
the attack was being made, and after the family had 
lain in hiding for three days, Indian canoes trans- 
ported them safely to the St. Joseph Valley, where 
they were sheltered until November. Then an Indian 
friend conducted all but Mr. Kinzie across the penin- 
sula to Detroit; him they insisted on keeping with 
them several months longer, so that they might try to 
help him in recovering what still remained of his prop- 
erty. When they went on trips with him for this pur- 
pose, they disguised him in their own costume and, 
paint, so that he might not be recognized and captured 
by those who believed in exterminating the whites. In 



56 INDIAN SKETCHES 

time, however, his anxiety for his family induced 
him to follow them to Detroit, though that city was 
still in the hands of the British. 

These friendly chiefs of the St. Joseph Valley also 
saved the lives of Captain and Mrs. Heald after the 
Dearborn massacre. They had fallen prize to the chief 
of the Kankakee Valley, who took pity on them when 
he saw the wounded and enfeebled state of Mrs. Heald, 
and released her husband, so that he might accompany 
her to their friends. Some of his people were so dis- 
pleased at this, however, that he started for the St. Jo- 
seph to reclaim his prisoners. He probably sent word 
ahead that he was coming unwillingly, for news of his 
intention preceded him^ and before he arrived Topina- 
bee and Pokagon, in whose charge the prisoners were, 
held a hasty council with Mr. Kinzie and the princi- 
pal men of the village, and helped the prisoners to em- 
bark for Mackinaw in charge of one of their guides. 
On arriving from Kankakee, the chief found to his 
satisfaction that the canoe^had gone beyond recall. 

The war of Tecumseh and the attack on Fort Dear- 
born were hardly wise on the part of the Indians, but 
they were the natural action for a brave people to 
take. Chief Pokagon II says of this, 'Tn their loyal 
zeal they could not comprehend their own weakness 
and the strength of the dominant race, but, being 
pressed onward by as noble motives as ever glowed 
in the breast of mortals, they fought most desperately 
for home and native land. When white men pillaged 
and burned our villages and slaughtered our families, 
they called it honorable warfare, but when we retail- 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 57 

ated, they called it butchery and murder. When the 
white man's renowned statesman, Patrick Henry, pro- 
claimed in the ears of the English colonies, 'Give me 
liberty, or give me death,' he was applauded by his 
people, and that applause still rolls on undying to free- 
dom's farthest shores. All the civilized world, since 
then, through the centuries of time, have continued 
to applaud that sentiment. But let Pokagon ask, in 
all that is sacred and dear to mankind, why should the 
red man be measured by one standard and the white 
man by another?" When Secretary Gresham and 
President Cleveland investigated the claims and his- 
tory of this tribe in 1897, they admitted that the In- 
dian outbreak was only a natural retaliation of this 
proud and sensitive race against their enemy, the 
aggressors. 

A little later, Tecumseh and his allies, the British, 
continued their warfare against the United States, 
but Pokagon still kept the peace and urged his people 
to learn to live among civilized men, instead of making 
war upon them. 

Again in 1829, when the wrongs done to the In- 
dians in the Mississippi Valley had maddened Black 
Hawk into making war. Chief Pokagon did what he 
could to live up to the teachings of his Christian re- 
ligion and follow the path of peace with his white 
brothers, instead of taking the warpath. At Pare 
aux Vaches, Black Hawk addressed the assembled 
chiefs of the Pottawatomies at a time when Pokagon 
was expected not to be present, urging them to take 
a stand with him against the encroachments of the 



58 INDIAN SKETCHES 

white men. The war party had tried to conceal their 
purpose from Pokagon, knowing that he would oppose 
them, but he had been secretly apprised of what was 
going on, and appeared in their midst at the moment 
when it seemed that the council was about to consent. 
Understanding the purpose in their hearts, he de- 
nounced it in measured but unsparing terms. Turn- 
ing upon the chiefs who had favored war, he so over- 
powered them by his words that they cast down their 
eyes to the ground, and then covered their faces w-ith 
their robes. They were finally completely overcome, 
leaped to their feet, turned their backs upon him, and 
fled away into the forest. So his faith prevailed, and 
that day he saved his people from the fate of Black 
Hawk's tribe. 

As white men continued to come west, the Indians 
were urged to sell their lands, and various chiefs did 
so, some when they were intoxicated with ''fire-water," 
and others when they were surrounded by troops and 
intimidated into the act. Pokagon and Menominee 
refused to sell. Finally the President, at Washington, 
sent for them, along with others of the western chiefs, 
to meet him and consider whether they would accept 
a price for their land in the Northwest Territory and 
move away to a reservation in Kansas beyond the 
Great River. The chiefs started from Menominee's 
village at Twin Lakes, travelling by pony, a splendid 
company to see — Pokagon, Menominee, Petoskey, 
Blackbird, and many others, all dressed in ornamental 
buckskin, with fine beaded moccasins, and caps adorned 
with eagle feathers. The artist Catliri admired them 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 59 

so much when he saw them passing through Philadel- 
phia that he left his home in the east and travelled for 
the next eight years in the west to study and picture 
them in their home surroundings. They departed just 
as the forest leaves were turning red, and came back 
when the trees were green in the spring. They had 
been entertained and feasted all of the time by the 
great white chief; but when he urged them to sell their 
lands to the white people, they replied persistently that 
they would not leave their homes and the graves of 
their fathers and mothers. When they reported to 
their people that the land had not been sold, all re- 
joiced and clapped their hands, and shouted, ''Good! 
good ! good !" for they loved their homes and the 
graves of their nation. 

It is scarcely possible for modern white men to 
understand how an Indian felt about leaving the dead 
of his family, and those of his tribe. It would have 
been possible for the Greeks and the Romans to do so, 
or the Chinese and the Japanese, for all of those na- 
tions have believed as the Indians did, that the dead 
remember the living, still take interest in the family 
life, and can be feasted in spirit by gifts, and by atten- 
tions paid at the grave. The living relatives often 
visited the tomb, and did penance there so that the 
dead might not be made to sufifer for the wrongs they 
had done. A mother would often sit at the grave of 
her child and chat with it in fond affection, as if it still 
lived. The Pottawatomie tribe did not bury their dead, 
for fear that wolves might disturb the graves, but 
dressed the bodies in beautiful clothing, wrapped them 



6o INDIAN SKETCHES 

close in buffalo robes, and laid them away in the 
branches of trees, with their faces turned to the rising 
sun, and food and tobacco enough for the journey to 
the Spirit Land.; The living still gave honor to the 
dead, and twice every year, with solemn songs and 
spirit dances, the whole tribe met and held the "Feast 
of the Dead," when they shared with the departed the 
best food that the Great Spirit has given to man — the 
flesh of the buffalo and the pigeon. The last solemn 
service was held in the night, when great bonfires were 
lit, and all of the tribe, old and young, looking like 
spirits themselves as they moved in the dance from 
fire to fire of the camp, cast bits of the flesh of their 
feast into the flames, w^hile they chanted, "We are go- 
ing about like spirits, feeding the dead." If their 
lands were sold and strangers came into possession, 
who would honor their dead? 

In 1832, when the Michigan militia were quartered 
near the Mission at Niles, having been enlisted to help 
in suppressing Black Hawk, and the Sacs and Kicka- 
poos of Wisconsin, who were on the war-path. Chief 
Pokagon was called in council. Answering the ques- 
tions of the officers, he stated that he was a Christian, 
and was anxious for all of his brethren to join him in 
being at peace with all men; that he had advised his 
people not to drink whisky, but to plant corn and live 
as white people do; that if their services were needed 
he was willing to send some of the young men of his 
tribe with the American army to help fight the Sacs 
and Kickapoos. "Everybody knows me and know^s 
that Pokagon won't lie," he assured the officers; in 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 6i 

turn they assured him that the President and the Gov- 
ernor would protect the Indians if they remained at 
peace. To these warm assurances, he answered : ''We 
are glad that our fathers will protect us. I see no 
pleasure except in clothing my children and tilling my 
ground. I believe that there is but one God, and that 
we are all brothers." 

But in 1833, the next year, he yielded to the pressure 
of the times and signed a deed* transferring 1,000,000 
acres to the United States, including the hunting 
grounds of the tribe and the lowlands at the western 
turn of the lake, called She-go g-ong, the present site 
of Chicago. The past had shown that Indians could 
not protect their lands against the ruffians of the bor- 
der and squatters without resorting to violence, and 
the course of Black Hawk's war, just ended, had 
shown the penalty if they tried to defend their rights 
by force. The advice of the best friends that the In- 
dians had among the white officials and settlers doubt- 
less decided him to take this step. It is told that 
Pokagon wept, and said he had rather die than sign 
away the land. 

In 1836 preparations were begun to carry out the 
provisions of the treaty, and a conference was held 
between officials of the United States and the chiefs 
and head warriors of the Indian tribes. From a paint- 
ing made at that time, now first reproduced, we can 
view that scene and almost be present at the meeting 
in the forest. Colonel Pepper, the special commis- 
sioner, sat in the foreground w^ith General Harrison 

*See Appendix, p. 112, for articles of treaty and names of chiefs. 




62 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 63 

and other officers, and around them many Indian 
braves were grouped, with a few of their French 
friends, all attentively listening to a speech that was 
being made by a chief and translated by an interpre- 
ter. Above them the American flag floated in the 
sunshine, and the scene was bright with the colors of 
the native peace-costume. No eagle-feathered head- 
dresses were worn, for that would have betokened a 
war spirit, but bright turbans, or scarfs, adorned the 
heads of the w^arriors, for this was a sign of peace. 
At that time no hats were worn by the Indians, but 
the hat was the distinctive sign of the white man — 
indeed, in their spoken language, their picture writing, 
and their sign-language, the name they used for 
'Svhite man" was not "pale-face," as many suppose, 
but "man-with-a-hat-on." It is probable that even 
now they did not understand what the sale of their 
land involved. Their attitude was very friendly. In 
later years they did not blame these officers or the 
President for the misfortunes that soon followed. 

Pokagon's own home and village at Bertrand, in 
the valley of the St. Joseph, were not included in the 
sale, and a small tract farther north in western Michi- 
gan was reserved, to which he and his people were 
to retire. This was a sacred spot in Indian tradition, 
the cradle of the race, the happy hunting ground of 
the golden age, a very heaven on earth for beauty, 
with the high sand-dunes that overlook the great lake, 
Mishi-gum, and the beautiful harbor of South Haven. 
On the highest of these dunes, the Great Spirit, Kiji- 
Manito, had his throne. And thence he proceeded to 



64 INDIAN SKETCHES 

work out the grand conceptions of his soul, creating 
the most beautiful rocks of the long coast, the state- 
liest forests of the whole peninsula, the loveliest 
flowers that ever bloomed, and birds that sing the 
sweetest songs ever heard by mortal ear. 

The greatest masterpiece that Kiji-Manito created 
there was man. In those early days a beautiful in- 
land lake, called Sag-i-a-gan, spread its waters here 
for a canoe day's journey toward the rising sun, and 
this happy spot Kiji-Manito favored beyond all others. 
He paced the soil of its shore with giant strides, and 
scattered around his riches. After he had created the 
fish of the waters, the fowls of the air, and the beasts 
of the lands, his works still failed to satisfy his soul, 
so he called the Great Council of Manito-og (the 
spirits of sea and land, his agents), and revealed to 
them the desire of his heart to create a new being that 
should stand erect and possess the combined intelli- 
gence of all the living creatures he had made. In spite 
of the efforts of the evil manitos to frustrate his pur- 
pose, he led his hosts into the wilderness to the shore of 
Sag-i-a-gan. There, with flashing eyes and a voice 
like thunder, he spoke a command : "Come forth, ye 
lords of the world!" At his words the earth trem- 
bled, the water began to boil, the ground opened, and 
from out of the red clay that lined the lake came forth 
a man and a woman, like flying fish out of the water. 
In the presence of this wonder, all was as still as death. 
A dark cloud hung over the lake. It began to boil 
again. The awful silence was again broken, when 
Kiji-Manito commanded, ''Come forth, ye friends of 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 65 

man!" This time forth leaped at once from out the 
lake a pair of snow-white dogs, and they lay down 
where stood the new-made pair, kissing their feet and 
hands. 

Another masterpiece of the skill of the Great Spirit, 
Kiji-Manito, was the great bow that he made. At 
least two arrow-flights in length he stretched it along 
the curve of the shore, and painted it from end to end 
in iridescent colors. While he was fashioning this 
bow, the evil manitos tried to frustrate his purpose. A 
cyclone swept from the setting sun across the great 
lake, lightning flashed across the heavens, thunder and 
the roaring waves rolled their awful burden on the 
land, the earth shook, and rain beat against Kiji-Man- 
ito; but he stood firm in his majesty, smiling in the 
teeth of the storm. When at length the dark clouds 
rolled away, and Kesus, the sun, lit up the passing 
gloom, Kiji-Manito picked up his bow, bent it across 
his knee, and blew a blast of his breath upon it that 
swept it eastward between the sunshine and the clouds. 
As there it stood, resting either end upon the trees, 
painting them all aglow, it added glory to the sun- 
shine, and, gazing upon its beauty and grandeur as it 
arched the departing storm, Kiji-Manito shouted in tri- 
umph above the thundering waves, "All men, behold 
my bow in the clouds ! See, it has no string or quiver ! 
It is the Bow of Peace ! Tell it to your children's chil- 
dren that Kiji-Manito made it and placed it there, that 
generations yet unborn might learn that he loved Peace 
and hated War!" 

Loving peace and hating war, it was natural that 



66 INDIAN SKETCHES 

Pokagon and his people should seek out this retreat ; 
and it was fortunate that the natural advantages and 
tradition of the place could help to soften the pang 
with which they would give up their homes in the St. 
Joseph Valley. If their tribe was to become extinct, 
on what spot could it meet its last defeat with better 
spirit than on this, where it had been created? Tra- 
dition told that Sag-i-a-gan was a pleasant place to 
live in, even after the Golden Age had departed. Then 
a village named Nik-o-nong (meaning The Beautiful 
Sunset) had been built on the shore, through which 
the great trail passed to the vast northern forests, 
where deer and elk and bear were plentiful, while an- 
other trail passed to the prairies of the West, where 
herds of buffalo roamed in their migrations. Flocks 
of wild pigeons filled the trees with their nests; duck, 
geese, and swan clouded the lake, and fish swarmed 
within it. In earlier generations, the men did not need 
to go to the chase in Nik-o-nong, for both fish and flesh 
could be taken a bow-shot from their wigwams. The 
place was even now rich in game and fish. 

When they sold their lands, some of the chiefs 
agreed that they would move to Kansas in 1838 with 
their people, and now, when the time approached, all 
were, by an oversight, notified to move, including 
Menominee and Chief Pokagon. After this order had 
been received, it was discussed at the council. Me- 
nominee, then a stately man of seventy, arose, and, 
with commanding dignity that profoundly impressed 
the white men present, delivered an oration in the 
peculiar Indian manner. He refused to obey: 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 67 

''Members of the council, the President does not 
know the truth. He, Hke me, has been imposed upon ! 
He does not know that you made my young chiefs 
drunk and got their consent, and pretended to get 
mine. He does not know that I have refused to sell 
my lands, and still refuse! He would not by force 
drive me from my home, the graves of my tribe, and 
of my children who have gone to the Great Spirit ! 
nor allow you to tell me your braves would take me 
tied like a dog, if he knew the truth. My brother, 
the President, is just, but he listens to the word of 
young chiefs who have lied, and when he knows the 
truth he will leave me to my own. I have not sold 
my lands ! I will not sell them ! I have not signed 
any treaty ! and I will not sign any ! I am not going 
to leave my lands! and I don't want to hear anything 
more about it !" 

But the eloquence and the imposing presence of the 
dignified old chief did not succeed in holding him his 
own. Some unprincipled white men who had squatted 
on the reservation and who intended to take posses- 
sion of the land illegally as soon as the Indian tribe 
had been driven from it, now brought matters to a 
crisis by setting fire to several of the wigwams of 
Menominee's village and exciting the injured parties 
to retaliate. The Indians then attacked his cabin and 
chopped his door with their hatchets, threatening his 
life. 

In the disturbance following, some of the white 
men petitioned Governor Wallace to call out volun- 
teers and transport the Indians to Kansas by force. 



68 INDIAN SKETCHES 

Governor Wallace should have arrested and punished 
the white men, and have judged, as Washington had, 
that troops should not be sent against the Indians 
when they were within their rights ; but he did as the 
petition requested, and that so rapidly and secretly 
that the Indians had no warning of hostility against 
them, and so no chance to appeal and argue their case. 
Like the Acadians expelled from Nova Scotia by the 
British, they were cunningly given notice to attend a 
meeting in the chapel where their kind Father Petit 
conducted services. When they assembled, the doors 
were closed against them and they found themselves 
surrounded by armed soldiers, while a proclamation 
was read to them that was to be the doom of many. 
Those who had sold their lands and were expecting 
to be removed had been prepared by Father Petit for 
their exodus, and would have gone without resisting. 
His last service in the little chapel had been his fare- 
well address to those departing, and his prayers for 
their success in establishing their new hunting 
grounds. 

One can imagine the indignation and anger of the 
captives when they found themselves caught by this 
trick. Disarmed as they were, it must have been their 
first impulse to fight desperately, but this would have 
been madness, for all would have been killed. Like 
the Acadians. they yielded to the teaching of their 
religion. It happened that at this time Father Petit 
was not at the mission. Perhaps old Chief Menom- 
inee, who had preached to them for many years be- 
fore this chapel had been built, was again the leader 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 69 

who spoke to them and calmed the outraged captives 
into submission, just as the good Father FeHcian had 
calmed the Acadian captives : 

Raising his reverend hand, with a gesture he awed into 

silence 
All that clamorous throng; and thus he spake to his 

people ; 
Deep were his tones, and solemn ; in accents measured 

and mournful 
Spake he, as after the tocsin's alarm, distinctly the clock 

strikes. 
**What is this ye do, my children? what madness has 

seized you? 
Is this the fruit of my toils, of my vigils and prayers 

and privations? 
Have you so soon forgotten all lessons of love and for- 
giveness ? 
This is the house of the Prince of Peace, and would you 

profane it 
Thus with violent deeds and hearts overflowing with 

hatred ? 
Lo ! where the crucified Christ from his cross is gazing 

upon you ! 
See ! in those sorrowful eyes what meekness and holy 

compassion ! 
Hark ! how those lips still repeat the prayer, 'O Father, 

forgive them !' 
Let us repeat that prayer in the hour when the wicked 

assail us, 
Let us repeat it now, and say, 'O Father, forgive them.' " 

Few were the words of rebuke, but deep in the hearts 
of his people. 

Sank they, and sobs of contrition succeeded the passion- 
ate outbreak, 

While they repeated his prayer, and said, ''O Father, for- 
give them !" 



70 INDIAN SKETCHES 

The saddest incident at the departure was the gath- 
ering to say farewell in the cemetery, the village of 
the dead. The poor captives were still surrounded by 
troops and under a guard. They met in silence, and 
at first were able to control themselves. Several 
friendly white settlers of the neighborhood addressed 
them, and then their chiefs spoke. It was more than 
their spirit could bear, and they broke into tears. All 
wept and wailed, and could not be comforted. The 
troops finally dispersed them forcibly, because they 
feared that, unarmed as the Indians were, they might 
grow desperate and break into violence. 

The next morning soldiers tore down and destroyed 
the wigwams and cabins, and the march began. Me- 
nominee's village, the largest in the country, was left 
as if it had been swept by a tornado. Pokagon and a 
few of his own people were permitted to withdraw to 
their lands in Michigan. The captives were marched 
away while the fire still burned, and the last they saw 
of their homes was the smoke hanging over the trees 
that screened the ruins. 

Some of the details of what happened from day to 
day to Menominee's people on their long march of a 
thousand miles are given in the report made to Gov- 
ernor Wallace by General Tipton, the commander in 
charge of the expedition. The weather was unusually 
hot for September, so that there was much sickness, 
for clouds of dust hung over the column, and the only 
water they had was supplied from stagnant wayside 
pools. 

First in the forlorn procession went the flag of the 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 71 

United States, borne by a dragoon; after that fol- 
lowed the baggage, then a wagon occupied by the 
native chiefs, among whom was Menominee. The 
chiefs were bound and under guard as prisoners of 
war, until Father Petit, who overtook them on the 
march, petitioned the commander, and secured their 
release. The main body of the captives followed. The 
women and children, mounted on ponies, marched in 
file, Indian fashion, the men on foot. Unwilling strag- 
glers werv driven by dragoons and militiamen along 
the flanks of the caravan with violent words and ges- 
tures. The sick came last, crowded into heavy wagons 
that jolted over rough roads and open prairies. ''Some 
they drove like cattle, and some they tied like sheep 
for market and carried in wagons! A great many 
died on the way and were eaten by vultures and wolves. 
I do not like to talk about it ; my heart gets sad," said 
an Indian, bitterly, many years after. 

The story of the suffering of the exiles is too sad 
to dwell upon. On one single day the physician of 
the company reported three hundred cases of illness, 
for the children were soon reduced to a wretched 
state of languor and exhaustion, and large numbers 
of them and of the aged were dying. At Danville, Illi- 
nois, the party halted two days. Father Petit wrote, 
"When we quitted the spot we left six graves under 
the shadow of the cross." 

The course of the march was marked by wayside 
graves, and the suffering of spirit among those who 
remained must have been greater than any pain that 
the body can bear. Around them, all was misery and 



y2 INDIAN SKETCHES 

the fulfilment of their fears since white men first 
entered their country; behind them, in the rich lands 
of their fathers, lay the graves of their dead, and 
the traditions of their greatness ; before them stretched 
an unknown land, and a future that offered no promise. 
In these days of their wrongs and sorrows the In- 
dian captives had one good friend and comforter, 
their devoted priest, Father Petit: 

Onward from fire to fire, as from hearth to hearth in his 
parish. 

Wandered the faithful priest, consoling, and blessing and 
cheering. 

Like unto shipwrecked Paul on Melita's desolate sea- 
shore. 

Like Father Felician, he administered to them his 
love and sympathy, as well as their religion. 

"Benedicte/' murmured the priest, in tones of deep com- 
passion. 

More he fain would have said, but his heart was full, and 
his accents 

Faltered and paused on his lips, as the feet of a child on 
the threshold, 

Hushed by the scene he beholds, and the awful pres- 
ence of sorrow. 

Father Petit saw the Pottawatomie captives estab- 
lished in their new homes in Kansas before he started 
to return, and may be counted among the victims of 
the march, for he died of the prevalent fever, which 
he had contracted before he began his return trip to 
the St. Joseph mission. He was buried at St. Louis, 
and later his remains were brought back for interment 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS yz 

to Notre Dame, where they repose under the sanc- 
tuary of the chapel. There a tablet commemorates 
him. 

It is not known where Chief Menominee is buried. 
It is thought that he died on the way to Kansas, or 
shortly after his tribe reached the new reservation. 
The worst had come to the poor old man, and, as he 
jolted over the road to Kansas, his heart must some- 
times have been bitter and in need of the consolation 
of his devoted priest and his belief in God, for the 
men he trusted had failed him! He had not become 
unjust in his judgment, but still said, 'The President 
does not know the truth. He, like me, has been im- 
posed upon. He would not by force drive me from 
my home, the graves of my tribe, and of my children 
who have gone to the Great Spirit. My brother, the 
President, is just." 

The incident was closed, and it was many years be- 
fore white men thought much of the wrongs that he 
and his red men suffered. But at last sympathy spoke, 
and, just seventy-one years after Menominee and his 
people were carried captives from their homes, the 
state of Indiana raised a monument in his honor on 
the spot where his chapel had stood. It was a tardy 
recognition, but it does him justice and its inscription 
in granite will help to tell the future his story. 



74 INDIAN SKETCHES 

IN MEMORY OF 

CHIEF MENOMINEE 

and his 

BAND OF 859 POTTAWATOMIE INDIANS, 

Removed from this Reservation, September 4, 1838 

By a Company of Soldiers under the Command of 

COL. JOHN TIPTON 

Authorized by Governor David Wallace 



Governor J. Frank Hanley 



Author of Law 
Representative Daniel McDonald, Plymouth. 

It was poetically fit that the great-granddaughter 
of Chief Pokagon I unveiled the monument of Me- 
nominee and made an address on the occasion. .When 
she drew aside the folds of the flag of the United 
States that veiled it, and the granite figure stood forth 
as in life, in Indian costume, crowned with eagles' 
feathers, she said, *'It will stand as a monument of 
humanity, teaching generations yet unborn that the 
white man and the red man are brothers and God is 
the father of all." That faith she had learned from 
her fathers, the friends of Menominee. 

Another speaker said that day at the unveiling of 
the monument, ''It has taken many years for the world 
to reason that the Indian ever had a case before the 
bar of justice ; but that day has come. We hail it 
with gladness, for it means the supremacy of justice 
in the white man's breast." An editorial added, ''Many 
a monument has stood proudly to commemorate a 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS 75 




CHIEF MENOMINEE 
Statue erected by the State of Indiana at Twin Lakes 



76 INDIAN SKETCHES 

noble deed, but never before have we heard of one in 
memory of a wrong. Is tiot the Menominee monu- 
ment a glowing witness to our advance in moral 
standards? We take as a good omen this awakened 
spirit of justice; we believe it bodes the dawning of 
a beneficent day when the stronger shall no longer 
prey upon the weak. To frankly confess a fault indi- 
cates a higher plane of honor and sincerity." 

This granite figure does, indeed, stand as a monu- 
ment of humanity and appreciation of the courage, 
devotion, faith, and sorrows of the old chief whom 
men used despite fully, but it has a larger aspect also. 
It is a voice from the present speaking to the future 
of an injustice done and repented, an appeal from the 
fathers who erected it to the sons who will follow: 
Do justice, and make old wrongs right. The state of 
Indiana has tried to make the old wrong right — to 
her honor. 

When Menominee and his people were taken to 
Kansas, Chief Leopold Pokagon and a few of his 
tribe from the St. Joseph Valley were permitted to 
go into their reservation in Michigan, but many of his 
people who should have gone with him were taken 
away to Kansas. He did not blame the govern- 
ment; but, like Menominee, laid the blame upon men 
who wanted Indian lands. He struck no blow; he 
held to his Christian faith, with the consolation that 
it is better to endure a wrong than to commit one. 
Immediately after his settlement in the new home, he 
built a church for his people at Silver Creek, two 
miles northwest of Dowagiac, and for the short term 



LAST OF THE POTTAWATOMIE CHIEFS yy 

of his remaining life he went on his way quietly, doing 
the best he could, settling his people in their new 
home and bringing them into friendly relations with 
their white neighbors. Two years later he died and 
was laid to rest in his church, beloved and mourned 
by his people, and respected by the white settlers. 

Pokagon's luxuriant forests have been felled, 
the grains of the white men are grown in his soil, 
the wigwams of his people have vanished, and his 
little log church has been replaced by a larger, modern 
one. Those who knew that region in the earlier years 
would hardly recognize it if they returned to it now. 
Thus time brings a change in all material things. But 
the noble spirit of the old chief will outlast Time, 
and his name should be kept alive in the land of his 
fathers, that he signed away to win peace for his 
people. 



CHAPTER III. 

CHIEF SIMON POKAGON. 
1825-1899. 

Pokagon II was the son of Pokagon I and a 
sister of Topinabee, and he was born at Bertrand, 
in the St. Joseph Valley, in 1825. The priest of the 
mission baptized him with the name of Sinion Poka- 
gon. Until he was more than twelve years of age, 
he spoke only his mother tongue, with a few French 
words added. He said ''boo-zhoo" in greeting — as 
all Indians did — because the missionaries had greeted 
the Indians with a ''bon jour," which they politely tried 
to imitate. 

When Pokagon was born, his father and the Potta- 
watomie tribe still owned the great tract of land at 
the end of the lake; and still twice a year all of the 
families of the tribe journeyed there and put up their 
wig\vams at the place called ''She-gog-ong," which 
had been one of the richest hunting grounds from 
ancient times, for there in the spring and the fall herds 
of buffaloes and dense flocks of birds passed, round- 
ing the foot of the lake in their migrations north and 
south, such vast herds that the earth shook under their 
tread, and sometimes at the bank of a river a stampede 

78 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 79 

occurred, when many were trampled to death, so that 
the hunters did not even need to chase them, but could 
skin them and cut them up on that spot. 

In the greening of the spring the tribe stayed at 
the camp near Chicago until the wild pigeons had 
flown northward, for the heavy clouds of those birds 
passed so low that even the women and the children 
could discharge arrows into the air and bring them 
down in great numbers. What they did not eat at 
their feast that day, they dried and smoked, to use 
later, when they had gone back to their homes in Wis- 
consin, Michigan, Indiana, or other localities in Illi- 
nois. It was probably at such a spring meeting of 
the tribes that Marquette had addressed them, at 
Easter. 

In the spring the little Pokagon enjoyed the feast 
of thanksgiving, which they held according to 
the ancient custom, to express their gratitude to 
the Great Spirit for the bounty that they w^ere en- 
joying. They were glad that the winter was past and 
that nature was putting forth her new life, and to 
symbolize this they raised a high pole in the centre 
of the camp, and on it hung their old garments; then, 
in their new spring clothes, they all danced about the 
pole in a circle. As the earth had shed her last year's 
raiment, so they shed theirs; and, as the earth was 
now clad in new robes, so they arrayed themselves 
in theirs. And while they w^ere dancing with joy 
around the pole, they sang their songs of thanksgiv- 
ing, and of prayer that Kiji Manito, the Great Spirit, 
who had brought back Kesus, the sun, would look 



8o INDIAN SKETCHES 

down with love and compassion upon his dependent 
children and give them a year of plenty. When the 
night came on they built their fires and feasted, and 
shared their feast with the dead, for they did not for- 
get their loved ones, and believed that the dead, also, 
did not forget. 

For most of the year the women and children lived 
in their quiet wigwams in the forest, while the men 
of the tribe roamed the woods to procure a supply of 
game. In the winter, flocks of wild turkeys and deer 
came south; and each of the seasons brought them 
its gifts. The tribe were Christian, and black-robed 
priests and other missionaries came and went, as the 
best of their friends, to teach them the good way of 
life. 

But the seasons were not all sunshine, and the for- 
est life had its care. White men were moving west- 
ward, and the red men feared them even more than 
white men feared the red. The little Pokagon was 
present, a child of eight, when his father was forced 
tO' sell the tribe's land; he was only twelve when his 
family barely escaped being exiled to Kansas along 
with Menominee. That was a time of sorrow, and 
its shadow hung over the house still when his father 
died, two years later. Then the tribe was without a 
chief to advise them how to secure their rights; dis- 
putes now broke out among them; and all were poor, 
for the pay that had been promised for their land 
had not been received, and they did not have skill in 
making a living in civilized life, as the white men do. 

However, the boy Pokagon was happy, for his 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 8i 

mother was loving and kind, and soon he was sent 
to school to learn the white man's language, and to 
study so that he might be a capable man. For five 
years he was at different schools; then he came back 
to his mother and his people, and later became their 
chief. 

The kind words of those who had been his father's 
friends helped Pokagon to grow into such a man as 
his father had been. One would say, ''This young 
man is the son of old Pokagon," gazing at him as if 
he were even then the king of a mighty nation; "He 
was the most loyal, the bravest man that ever ruled a 
tribe." Another would remark, "He was a noble 
man, a perfect chief. He loved his people as he loved 
himself"; and a third would say, "He loved right 
and hated wrong. He always spoke the truth." Hear- 
ing such high praise of his noble father, the young 
man tried to act as was becoming in such a father's 
son, and, when he had acquired his education, he did 
not use it selfishly for his own advancement, but went 
back to teach civilized life as well as he could, to help 
his people. To quote his own poetic language, he 
urged his people to "be brothers to the white men," 
and "not to sigh for the years long gone, nor pass 
again over the bloody trail their fathers trod." He 
never became such a chief as his father was, with rec- 
ognized authority, the presiding spirit in the council 
house ; and the Indian people were not always willing 
to take his good advice. Sometimes they hurt his feel- 
ings by accusing him of not being a true Indian, be- 
cause he gave them advice that they did not like. 



82 INDIAN SKETCHES 

He once said, in old age, "I have stood all my life 
between the white people and my own people. With- 
out gun or bow I have stood betw^een the two con- 
tending armies, receiving a thousand wounds from 
your people and my own. And I have said to my 
people, when they were bitterly wronged, and felt 
mortally offended, 'Wait and pray for justice; the 
warpath will but lead you to the grave.' " 

Now, when the young chief returned from college, 
he asked his mother and an old man who w^as their 
friend to go with him in a canoe to some wild forest 
spot, where they could pitch a camp and hunt and fish. 
The old people were very glad to go, especially be- 
cause they saw by this that their boy's heart was the 
same as before he went away to school, and had not 
been spoiled by pride in his new accomplishments. 

The old man led the party to a wild romantic spot, 
where a deserted cabin, built of logs of giant size, 
stood among towering trees on a headland overlooking 
the water. Within this cabin birds had built their 
nest, and, when the new occupants entered, they flew 
out in alarm; but soon they saw that their neighbors 
were not enemies, and presently they returned, though 
with a suspicious eye. When the fire on the great 
hearth was lit, it was seen that the cabin had still 
other guests, for in the red light bats flitted and 
dodged, here and there, and then out of sight; and 
with a soft, whizzing sound, flying squirrels passed 
and repassed in curved lines from wall to wall. 

Before the dawn appeared, Pokagon waked, and 
stole out of the cabin in time to hear the morning 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 83 

feathered bells awaking nature with their ''Whippoor- 
will! Whippoorwill ! WhippoorwiH !" and the war- 
blers chanting their morning hymn, "Rejoice and 
praise Him! Rejoice and be glad! Rejoice! Re- 
joice! The sunrise was beautiful over the river and 
the hills. At last the alarm birds, the blue jays, 
screamed out their hawklike cries, when abruptly the 
concert of other birds closed,, and all was still. 

That morning the youth had the good luck to shoot 
a deer. He dressed it and carried it across his shoul- 
ders down a trail through the woods to the old wig- 
wam, where he heard his mother's voice, singing in 
her native tongue the words of a Christian song that 
she had learned at the mission. She did not see him, 
while he stood and listened with a full heart: • 

In Indian 

We-di bad-wi-a-ki mik-wan wad-ji-gang, 
We-di India's O-ja-kaw-es a-ga-ming, 
A-ton Afric's gi-siss sig-wan-og, 
Ti-ta-bi-na o-no as-a-wa-jo-ni-a e-kaw-og, 
We-di nib-i-waw ge-te-si-bi-og, 
We-di nib-i-wan gin-go ni-si- to-ta-wog 
Kin nan-don-ge a-bis-ko-nog 
Kin-og a-ki maw-tchi bi-mi-na- kog. 

In English 

From Greenland's icy mountains, 

From India's coral strand, 
Where Afric's sunny fountains 

Roll down their golden sand, 
From many an ancient river. 

From many a palmy plain. 
They call us to deliver 

Their land from error's chain. 



84 INDIAN SKETCHES 

Perhaps that was a song that his father had loved, 
for it expresses well his ideal, the love of men: ''1 
believe that there is but one God, and we are all 
brothers." After each stanza, and sometimes when 
half finished, the singer would pause and listen, ''as 
if she loved to hear the echoing angel of the woods 
join in the refrain," wrote her reverent son. With a 
heart full of her and her religion, heaven opened to 
his soul ; ''I saw Jesus standing with one hand on the 
sinner's head and the other resting on the throne of 
the Great Spirit, saying, 'Come unto me !' " 

After the song had ended^ Pokagon approached cau- 
tiously behind his mother and threw his burden down 
to give her a surprise. She screamed first, and then 
laughed till the woods rang. She praised his skill, 
felt of the soft, new, velvety horns, and then ex- 
claimed, "Beautiful, beautiful deer! How could you 
have the heart to take his life?" But she was pleased 
with the good food, and prepared it for future use, 
as was the custom of the tribe. 

The young Pokagon enjoyed the hunt and the fish- 
ing in that secluded place, with the wonderful grand- 
eur of the forests about him ; and, in communion with 
the Great Spirit, he could feel as his fathers had be- 
fore him, that he was chief of all he surveyed. His 
was an unspoiled Indian heart, of the kind that Father 
Petit had loved. 

Every now and then while living with his mother 
in this summer wigwam, Chief Pokagon saw a little 
Indian maiden with waist of red and skirt of brown 
going up the shore of the stream on the other side. 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 85 

As she gaily tripped along she always sang in mimicry 
of the music of the birds, and she imitated all of the 
birds perfectly. Sometimes a snow white deer played 
in circles around this maid, and when she passed out 
of sight, it would follow on her track as a dog fol- 
lows its master. He called his mother to see her, and 
the beauty of the girl and her wonderful singing made 
them both think she was no mortal maiden. "It must 
be she is from Manito Auke (the spirit world be- 
yond)," said the youth and his mother. 

But the maiden was not a spirit. The young chief 
dressed himself in his deerskin garments and mocca- 
sins, and put on his birch-bark cap trimmed with quills 
and feathers, and went forth with his bow and arrows, 
hoping to meet the maid. His hope was not in vain, 
for she soon came, singing like a bird. She had long 
black hair, and wore a single rosebud in it. 

"Boo-zhoo," he said, and then he added, ''Nic-con" 
(my friend) ; "Nic-con," she greeted him back with 
a modest smile, almost suppressed, from her dark eyes. 

Lonidaw and Pokagon soon became good friends, 
and he learned her sad story. Her mother had been 
his mother's playmate and foster-sister when they were 
children, and her father. Chief Sinegaw, one of his 
father's sub-chiefs, had been taken captive in the 
church at Twin Lakes and carried away to Kansas 
along with Menominee. When he was first made cap- 
tive, he sent word to his wife to flee into the swamp 
for safety, and this she did, finding a hiding-place in a 
hollow sycamore, where her little Lonidaw was born 
in the night, while the wolves were howling around 



86 



INDIAN SKETCHES 




LONIDAW AND POKAGON 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 87 

and a panther cried like a child in pain. The poor 
young mother lay in hiding without food for seven 
days, when she made her way to the north and found 
a home among the friendly Ottawa tribe. There she 
learned to make baskets and do grass work, with 
which to support herself and her little daughter. Late 
in the winter Sinegaw returned, having travelled from 
Kansas, on foot and alone, a thousand miles across 
the great plains and the ''father of waters." His health 
and spirits were so broken that he never recovered, 
and he began to drink ''fire-water," trying to gain new 
life; but, alas, that consumed him in a few years. "He 
faded and fell, as fall the leaves in the autumn," said 
his wife, in pity of his weakness. 

Soon Lonidaw, or Loda, as they called her, was 
more than a friend to the young Pokagon, for when 
the moon of flowers and bloom came again, and the 
birds were mating, and the trees were putting on their 
new robes of green^ he took her hand and she became 
his bride. "Simaw," said Lonidaw's mother, "you 
must not forget that the Great Spirit will watch your 
treatment of my only child, who was in sorrowing 
exile born. Yes, remember, His eyes are the sun by 
day, the moon and stars by night; hence, remember 
this, you cannot hide yourself, nor your acts, from 
Manito." No bells were rung, no feast was given, no 
priest declared them one; but they pledged their sin- 
cere faith before her mother and the King of Heaven, 
as was the Indian custom, and, hand in hand, followed 
an ancient trail, seeking a fit place to build. Beside 
Sa-gai-gan, the inland lake that is rich in Indian tra- 



88 INDIAN SKETCHES 

dition and beautiful with a growth of rushes and wild 
rice, they built their wigwam of birch bark under the 
towering trees. 



.-wt - '-'s > 


■M 






f\ 


f 


mP 


1^ ' 


^^K"' 


p^^ll^fc. 


^x -f ^-^JH 


Gb^jFt^ ^^^HH^^Hi 




i 


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-A 




F^Sal 





POTTAWATOMIE WIGWAM 

This was made of birch bark. It was erected at Twin Lakes, 
Indiana, at the unveiling of Menominee's Statue. It is now on 
the grounds of the Normal School at Ypsilanti, Michigan. Julia 
Pokagon Quagno, great-granddaughter of Pokagon I, is drawing 
the bow. 



It was a beautiful Indian home, full of peace and 
joy. The young chief called his wife in Indian lan- 
guage (for she knew no other), O-gi-maw-kwe Mit- 
i-gwa-ki, Queen of the Woods, and truly she was his 
queen, and c|ueen of all of the wild creatures about 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 89 

them. The milk white deer that had always followed 
her died of grief and jealousy because she loved Poka- 
gon best — the Indians said that it pined away into a 
wraith and vanished when they shot at it. Zowan, her 
dog, would gather flowers for her from the forest and 
lilies from the lakes, and she could charm the squirrels 
out of the trees and the birds out of the sky by talk- 
ing to them in their own language. While she held 
them under her spell, she would not let any one do 
them an injury, for she learned to rejoice with them, 
and to mourn with them, and had sympathy with all 
creatures of the wood. When people asked her to 
call birds and beasts together so that they could shoot 
them, Loda would say, ''No, no; I cannot tell them I 
am their friend, and while they trust in Loda have 
you shoot them down. I hate the snake, that charms 
to kill." She never betrayed the trust of the wild 
creatures of the wood. 

Pokagon's love for his little family was ''all a sea 
without a shore," he tells us, w^hen a little boy, Olon- 
daw, was born, and again when a little girl, Hazel- 
eye, arrived. The little boy learned to bend a bow 
and shoot arrows from it, and the little girl plaited 
rushes and played wath her dolls. She had boy dolls 
and girl dolls, and, w^hen she put them to sleep, she 
was a good little mother to them, for she carefully 
changed them from side to side so that they might 
have sweet dreams and sleep well. Olondaw taught 
Hazeleye to play with him at shooting, and made her 
a little bow and arrows. Her arrows were feathered 
white, and his were red. 



90 INDIAN SKETCHES 

When Olondaw was a half -grown boy he was sent 
away for three years to school, and at the end of that 
time came back a great, tall boy; but ail that he had 
studied there was little profit, for he had learned to 
drink liquor, and his mouth smelled of the dragon's 
breath. Before long his life went out, and his parents 
were left in the night of sorrow. His poor mother, 
Lonidaw, never recovered from the blow, and when 
she died she asked her husband to promise that as 
long as he lived he would fight the demon of fire- 
water, that had destroyed her father and her child, 
and many others of her race. This promise he gave her 
willingly, and he kept it well. In the years that fol- 
lowed he delivered many temperance sermons and ad- 
dresses, and translated many more into the Indian lan- 
guage. Like his noble father, he taught his people, 
by both precept and example, to drink no liquor. From 
early times the wise men of his tribe had fought the 
evil of intemperance ; in 1704 they and the neighboring 
tribes had petitioned the Governor in Montreal to stop 
the sale of liquor in the Indian lands. Chief Pokagon 
I forbade the traders to bring liquor into his territory, 
and if he found that his order had been disobeyed, he 
seized the barrels and poured the "fire-water" on the 
ground. 

When Lonidaw was gone, it seemed to Chief Poka- 
gon that the whole world had changed — the flowers 
that he saw through bitter tears seemed to droop along 
the trail where she had planted them, the birds about 
the lake seemed to join with the waves in chanting her 
requiem, and, as night came on, the fire-fly meteors 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 91 

that flashed on every side seemed to him hke guardian 
angels sent from the eternal world to guide her spirit 
home. 

Again and again Chief Simon Pokagon tried to 
persuade the United States Government to pay the 
claims of his people for the sale of their land, but 
little attention was paid by most of the officials before 
whom his case w^as laid. Perhaps they were too busy, 
or considered his claim outlawed. He had copies of 
all of the legal papers to prove his claim just. After 
President Lincoln took up the case, part of the money 
was paid. Some of the Pottawatomie Indians fought 
in the Civil War,' and after that conflict was ended 
President Grant "^received Chief Pokagon and thanked 
him for the services that the tribe had rendered to 
the nation. Together they smoked the calumet, but 
the last of the Indian claim remained still unpaid in the 
last decade of the century, when Pokagon had grown 
old. 

In the meantime, a world-city had grown up on the 
soil of the old camping ground at She-gog-ong, and, 
in 1893, proud young Chicago invited all of the 
world to be her guests and to attend her Columbian 
Exposition. Invitations w^ere sent out to all of the 
great nations, and on the opening day representatives 
from all had gathered there. Many commissioners 
and invited guests, of whom one was the Duke of 
Veragua, a descendant of Columbus, sat in places of 
honor — but nobody had remembered to honor the In- 
dians with a place, and Chief Pokagon and some of 
his people stood unasked amid the audience. The fair 



92 INDIAN SKETCHES 

was built upon the very spot where their tents had 
been pitched a generation back, and where the old 
chief had played when he was a child in his father's 
wugwam — and the ground had not been paid for. The 
busy world had forgotten. It was a tragic moment, 
and an orator might have touched men's hearts that 
day by telling of his presence. 

While Pokagon stood there, thinking sadly of the 
wrongs of his people, he made a resolution to do what 
he could to make men understand his race, and remem- 
ber; and in this frame of mind he wrote the address 
that is called The Red Man's Greeting. It might be 
better named The Red Man's Rebuke. It was dedi- 
cated to William Penn, and to all others who did jus- 
tice to the red man and recognized him as a brother ; 
and it spoke in a voice of righteous wrath the indigna- 
tion that the old chief felt on behalf of the Indian 
people. He printed it in a little book made of the bark 
of the white birch, the tree that supplies the Indians 
their writing material, their clothes and utensils, wig- 
wams and canoes, light and fire for the council cham- 
bers, even ribands with which their maidens tie the 
knot to seal the vows of their marriage. Pokagon 
thought the birch symbolically fit for his little book 
because it was so useful in Indian life, and because, 
like the Indian, it is vanishing from our forests. 

The justice of the reproach in the Red Mans Greet- 
ing, the manliness of its spirit, and the beauty of its 
style secured for it a wide attention. It awakened the 
conscience and touched the hearts of the public. ''It 
is a cry from the Indian heart for the woes of his 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 93 

people," wrote a reviewer, *'No one can read it with- 
out realizing the other side of the Indian question." 
It was full of indignation, but also free from vindic- 
tiveness. 

It was through the spirit breathed by the Red Man's 
Greeting that Mayor Harrison of Chicago and some 
ladies friendly to the Indian race invited Pokagon to 
attend the Fair as the guest of the city. The old chief 
met the committees with as much composure as if he 
had been among his own people in his own council- 
house. He made a speech, advising them to organize 
a congress for educated Indians to discuss the problems 
of their race : 

''I am glad that you are making an effort, at last, 
to have the educated people of my race take part in 
the great celebration. That will be much better for 
the good of our people in the hearts of the dominant 
race, than war-whoops and battle-dances, such as I to- 
day witnessed on Midway Plaisance. It will encourage 
our friends, and encourage us. To-morrow will make 
the sixtieth year that has passed since my father sold 
for his tribe over one million acres of land, including 
the site of this city and the grounds on which the 
Exposition now stands, for three cents an acre. I 
have grown old trying to get the pay for my people. 
I have just returned from the City of the Great 
Father, where I have been allowed by the Court of 
Claims one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, which 
I expect will soon be paid. We wish to rejoice with 
you, and will accept your invitation with gratitude. 
The world's people, from what they have so far seen 




CHIEF POKAGON 



In his tribal attire as he appeared at the World's Fair on Chicago 
Day, Oct. g, 1893 

Painted by M. O. Whitney 



94 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 95 

of us on the Midway, will regard us as savages ; .but 
they shall yet know that we are human as well as they. 
The children of my father will always love those w^ho 
help us to show that we are men/' 

The authorities now tried to atone for their over- 
sight, and made the old chief the centre of the cere- 
monies of the city's celebration. He was the link be- 
tween She-gog-ong, the wild tract of Indian land a 
generation past, and Chicago, one of the greatest com- 
mercial centres of the earth to-day. In the impressive 
historical pageant that moved through the city on Chi- 
cago Day, Pokagon stood the central figure, clad in 
the costume of the Pottawatomie chief of his father's 
generation, crowned with the eagle feathers, holding in 
his outstretched hands his father's copy of the deed of 
the Chicago lands, while around him the officials of 
the United States were grouped, dressed also in the 
costume of the early period. What a marvellous 
change had come about in one man's life, and what 
that change meant to the Indians! Again that day 
the old chief was the centre of the ceremonies, when 
he delivered the address at the west plaza of the Ad- 
ministration Building of the Exposition. The preface 
to his speech was his presentation to the city of the 
deed by which his father sold the land, and a request 
that he made the Mayor, Carter Harrison, to assist 
him in showing to the world the advancement that 
the Indians have made in this generation in inde- 
pendence and self-development. A new Liberty Bell 
had been suspended on the platform, and now, smiling 
so that he might hide his tears, he raised the rope of 



96 INDIAN SKETCHES 

red, white and blue, and rang out the message entrusted 
to him by his tribe — Peace on earth, good zvill to men; 
the Fatherhood of God, and the brotherhood of men. 
Laying aside his headdress of eagle feathers, that be- 
longed to him as a chief (he had not intended to wear 
it, but yielded to the wish of the committee), he de- 
livered his address. His manner was, as usual, quiet, 
dignified and self-possessed. His words were earnest, 
an exhortation to his people not to harbor bitterness 
for the wrongs that they had suffered, but to lay aside 
all tribal differences and become truly citizens, ''Kings 
and Queens of this Great Republic." At the conclu- 
sion of his speech he rose to a sublime climax of faith : 

"I now realize that the hand of the Great Spirit 
is open in our behalf; already He has thrown His 
searchlight on the vault of the heavens, and Christian 
men and women are reading in characters of fire well 
understood : 'The red man and the white man are 
brothers, and God is the Father of all/ " 

These are the words that Pokagon had adopted for 
his life message, and it is fit that they should be chis- 
elled upon his monument, when that is raised, to be 
treasured in the hearts of both the red and the white 
men of the future. 

The next occasion of his appearance was to him a 
very sad one, for personal reasons — the burial of 
Mayor Carter Harrison, who had been stricken down 
by assassination just before the close of the Columbian 
Exposition. One of the last kind acts of the Mayor's 
life had been to write to Pokagon, enclosing the money 
necessary for his expenses and inviting him to come 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 97 

again to Chicago, to be his guest and take part in the 
closing ceremonies. At the base of the Liberty Bell 
the old chief, broken by sorrow, spoke in honor of his 
dead friend. When he began his voice was scarcely 
above a whisper : 

'*He said we were brothers, and I loved him as such, 
for in his veins ran the blood of my race — Pocahontas ! 
On Chicago Day we both stood beside this bell. He 
then promised that he would help my people. I knew 
he would keep his word, and two days ago I received 
an invitation to become his guest. Gladly I came, but 
on the way I learned that he was dead. In my sorrow 
I knew not what to do. He alone at the fair welcomed 
those of my race who have climbed the heights of man- 
hood. He was to help my people get the money prom- 
ised them for the land on which stands the city he 
helped to make great. On the natal day of his city, 
he bade the Pottawatomies and all progressive Indians 
welcome. To-day we mourn him, for every Indian has 
lost a friend." 

It is gratifying to know that President Cleveland 
took the matter of the Pottawatomie claims into con- 
sideration, and that Congress adopted his recommenda- 
tion to pay the tribe the last of the unpaid purchase 
money. In 1896, sixty-three years after the land was 
sold by the father, the tribe received its pay through 
the efforts of the son. It was a meagre sum, compared 
with the value of the land, but it showed on the part of 
the Government good will and a desire to right old 
wrongs, and it gave the greatest satisfaction to the old 
chief and his people. When the claim was paid he 



98 INDIAN SKETCHES 

called his tribe together and again impressed upon their 
minds the necessity of building homes and raising 
crops, and he shared the money with them, and shared 
only equally. He did not even ask repayment for his 
expenses in obtaining it, and it was his pride that the 
youngest child of the tribe had received as large a 
share as he. "He was a good chief and loved his peo- 
ple as he loved himself" should be said of him, as it 
was said of his father. 

Pokagon appreciated the fact that the fate of his 
tribe is to be in the hands of its children, and so he had 
their education greatly at heart. He made frequent 
trips to the Government School for Indians at Law- 
rence, Kansas, and through his efforts many of the 
children of his tribe attended that school. In this 
good work he did for the Indian children what a 
kind priest had done for him when he was a child. 
He was very fond of children; ''He was a kind grand- 
father," says his own granddaughter, "and he always 
brought us candy when he came. Not all grandfathers 
do that." One of the occasions that he enjoyed very 
much in the last year of his life was that when he sent 
a greeting to the children of the Jackson Park and 
Ray Schools in Chicago for their Concert of Many 
Nations. For that concert the different groups of chil- 
dren were dressed in the national costumes of the 
various countries, and each group sang a cradle song 
of the nation it represented. The Indian group, pre- 
paring for its part of the entertainment, wrote to 
Chief Pokagon, requesting him to send them an Indian 
song, and in response he wrote for them the words of 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 



99 



his beautiful Queen of the Woods. It was set to music 
by Mrs. H. H. Hayes, one of the Chicago pioneers 
who had heard much Indian music in her girlhood, 
when members of her family had been among the offi- 
cials of the Northwest Territory, and who from love 
of the Indian's traditions and history of the city has 
done much to preserve them. 



Queen of the Woods. 

Words by Pokagon II, Hereditary Chief of Pottawatomies. 
(To be sung like the swaying of the breeze among the trees of the forest.) 




Solo. 



^-fetei 






=1: 



-t-:^- 
•-y- 



1. Now listen, dear children, there's 

2. The flowers looked up and 

3. Assheskimm'do'er thelake inher 

4. In the wild rose and dewdrop no 



■?i^9E3Ei5E5Eg3ENE5 



:4=; 



3=3EFi 



-'-^— «-'-$^— «-'-^— •-'-^— «- 
-•- -^- -•- -<s'- -#- -f^- -0- -^- m- 

PP Dolce andantino. cres. 






:c2:^:aidz^=ijz&-^: 



-J_J. 









100 



INDIAN SKETCHES • 



:> cres, :> 



,cres. 



rit. 



3^ 






--N-N 



t 



much I would tell you of a dusk - y eyed maiden of long, long a - 
smiled as she pa8sed,And joined with the birds in the songs which they 
birch - en ca - noe,Herdeer,whiteas8now,on the shore-trail would fol- 
jew - els she lack'd,And full well she knew where the red ber - ries 




cres. 



ll^—\l 






3= 



=t=t=t 



M—it—^ 



I I 




accel. 



•-^ 



V-^- 






-^-^- 



-•— •- 



go ! To whom squirrels would chat,in the best way they could, And all 
sang.And wherev - er she went, in her sun-shin - y mood, The 
low. As she sang the sweet songs of days of child-hood. While the 
grew, I wooed and I won this fair maid so good, And 




t^-- 



\—A- 






't:^- 



I I 



I I 



x-v^- 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 



lOI 



(Violin obligato or full orchestral accompaniment with Chorus.) 

.cres. ^ ff^ -^ /"^Chorus. -^ 



igEggg£gg agES:g±|iS5:[pa 



hail the fair maid-en as Queen of the wood ! 
chil - dren all hailed her as Queen of the wood ! . ^ ... , , 

winds and the waves mur mur'd "Queen of the wood ! " ^ ^"®®" °^ ^^^ ^°°^^ ' 
Po - kagon's bride was then Queen of the wood ! 




Wr. 




[echo.) ^ f ff^ {echo.)^ /// ^ rit. 



Repeat Chorus. 



M—^ 






s^^i 



Queen of the woods! All Hail, all Hail ! Queen of the woods! 




--■^- 



t 



::^=:: 



2 ^ZI- 



^- 



t=-t- 



^-9 



b^: 



pp {echo.) f ff {echo.)^ fff ^ rit. 



I I 



s=-? 









-^-~ 



G>- 



I 



Music by Mrs. H. H. Hayes, a student of Indian melody. 
Copyright, 1912, by H. H. Hayes. 



102 



INDIAN SKETCHES 



When the chil- 
dren had finished 
their singing, the 
Honorable Fernan- 
do Jones, who had 
lived in Chicago 
since its very early 
days and was now 
the vice-president of 
its Pioneer Society, 
came forward, 
dressed in Indian 
costume, and sang 
the song of the 
Queen of the Woods 
in the Indian lan- 
guage, calling her, 
as Pokagon did, 
0-gi-maw-que Mit- 
i-gwa-ki. He had 
played with Chief 
Pokagon when the 
two were children, 
and now told many 
anecdotes about this 
playmate, and about 
the great Chief Po- 
kagon I, his father. 
The Indian costume 
that he wore that day w^as the very garment he had 
worn sixty-four years earlier, in 1835, when he was 




FERNANDO JONES 

This portrait of the late Hon. Fer- 
nando Jones of Chicago shows the 
ancient Indian costume worn by him 
when a boy at the great Chicago En- 
campment, Sept., 1835. 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 103 

present at the last Pottawatomie encampment in Chi- 
cago. The suit had been made for him by the daugh- 
ter of a chief, and is to be preserved by the Historical 
Society of Chicago. 

After Pokagon's death, an Indian lullaby was found 
among his papers, which he is supposed to have writ- 
ten at the request of Mrs. Hayes. It is a song of his 
own home : 

HAZELEYE'S LULLABY 

O, close your bright eyes, brown child of the forest, 
And enter the dreamland, for you're tired of play; 

Draw down the dark curtain with long silken fringes, 
An-na-moosh* will attend on your mystical way. 

Chorus : 

Hush-a-by, rock-a-by, brown little papoose, 
O, can you not see, if you give the alarm, 
Zowan,t beside you, is willing and eager 
To guard and defend you, and keep you from 
harm? 

Wind-rocked and fur-lined, covered o'er with bright 
blanket, 

Your cradle is swung 'neath the wide-spreading trees. 
Where the singing of birds and chatting of squirrels 

Will lull you to rest 'midst the hum of wild bees. 

Chorus : 

Your father is hunting to bring home the bearskin. 
While mother plaits baskets of various hue, 

Na-ko-misJ is weaving large mats of wild rushes, 
And Nonnee§ sends arrows so swift and so true. 

Chorus : 

* A dog. t Grandmother. 

t Their dog. § Her liule brother. 



I04 INDIAN SKETCHES 

In the years following the World's Fair, Pokagon 
was honored by many invitations to speak on public 
occasions, and he often expressed his friendliness to- 
w^ard his white brothers and his appreciation of the 
work they had done in this land. These noble senti- 
ments, along with his personal dignity and courage, 
made white men appreciate him highly. From the 
hardy pioneers to the men of culture and learning in 
his audiences, all loved to hear Pokagon speak. He 
had a poet's heart, full of love and generosity, and his 
style was that of the Indian, with vivid pictures and 
wath figures of speech reflecting the most beautiful 
features of nature. In his delivery he was never any- 
thing but simple and direct, and all of the appreciation 
and public honor that he received did not make him 
self-conscious or spoil him in the least, by puffing him 
up with vanity. ''He was the humblest man I ever 
knew," said his life-long friend. "He was unrivalled 
in patience and forbearance." Pokagon avoided dis- 
cussing the wrongs done his people, for he was sensi- 
tive on that subject. "The authorities at Washington 
meant all right," he would say, like Chief Menominee, 
"but they were deceived by bad agents who made them 
false reports." He never show^ed a jealousy of the 
white men, but always admiration of their skill. Some 
of his speeches will best show the nobility of his spirit 
in these respects. 

One of his best speeches was made at the celebra- 
tion of the semi-centennial of the settlement of the city 
of Holland, Michigan, in 1897. The Dutch settlers 
of that "Colony," as it was called, like those of early 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 105 

New York, maintained happy relations with their In- 
dian neighbors, and were grateful to them for many 
kindnesses received in their times of need. "They 
were our best friends," said one of the pioneers. When 
the food of the settlement failed, the generous red men 
shared their supply of corn with the newcomers, and 
when the minister of the congregation lost his way in 
the frozen forest in winter, natives saved the life of 
the unconscious man by carrying him along to safety. 
The old chief's speech at Holland was delicately appre- 
ciative of the situation: 

"Ladies and Gentlemen: 

'T welcome you one and all as the true nobility of 
this land. I am indeed glad to meet you at this impor- 
tant meeting of the fathers and mothers who have re- 
claimed from an unbroken wilderness a paradise, if 
such there be on earth. 

'T w^ould not have you think that I flatter myself 
that I was invited here on account of my reputation 
for intelligence, as I keenly realize that you have 
looked forward to my coming with a sort of novel 
pride, that you might point me out to your children and 
say, 'Behold, a living specimen of the race that we once 
neighbored, a race that we once loved — and yet with 
that love was mingled distrust and fear.' 

"Our people who sleep beneath your soil came here 
from the coast of the Atlantic. They were pioneers in 
their time as you are to-day, and when they first en- 
tered these beautiful woodland plains they said in their 
hearts, 'We are surely on the borderland of the Happy 



io6 INDIAN SKETCHES 

Hunting Grounds beyond.' I pray you, do not covet 
the narrow ground they occupy and thereby desecrate 
and hide their resting place. For the good of your- 
selves and your children you had better erect some 
simple monument over their remains, and engrave 
thereon: 'An unknov^n Red Man lies buried here.' 

''Here our people built their wigwams, and their 
children played under the green pavilion of the mighty 
forests, as happily as your children now play in the 
open field or on your decorated lawns. I speak of this 
not complainingly, for I have always taught my people 
not to sigh for years gone by, nor pass again over the 
bloody trail their fathers trod. I fully realize that, as 
pioneers of this land, you had mountains of difficulty 
to overcome, of which our race knew not. The same 
forest that frowned upon you smiled upon us. The 
same forest that was ague and death to you, was our 
bulwark and defence. The same forest you have cut 
down and destroyed, we loved, and our great fear was 
that the white man in his advance westward would mar 
or destroy it. I fully realize how hard you labored, 
day in and day out, year in and year out, to reclaim 
your farms from the unbroken forests, until the 
wilderness budded and blossomed as the rose. I pray 
that your children will fully appreciate the goodly in- 
heritance they have and will receive from your hands. 
Do not forget the command : 'Honor thy father and 
mother, that thy days may be long upon the land, which 
the Lord thy God, the Great Spirit, hath given thee !' 
As your parents cut down the mighty forests that cov- 
ered the land, so may you push forward the great car 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 107 

of reformation, until all enemies that press down the 
right and uphold the wrong shall be overthrow^n. 

''Fathers and Mothers! How dear those names! 
And while I have here stood among strangers, my 
heart has continually whispered in my ears, saying, 
Tokagon, your father and mother a century ago- 
passed and repassed this very spot along their winding 
trails/ Mr. Prentice, an honored citizen of this coun- 
try, who has just gone into the world beyond, were 
he alive and here to-day, would tell you how when he 
was a young man, lost and starving, he found our wig- 
wam home, and how he shared our simple meals and 
beds for many moons. We loved him dearly, and 
when he left us, we all wept. It rejoices my heart to 
feel that he and my father are in that Great Wigwam, 
where there are many rooms prepared by our Heavenly 
Father. 

"I am getting old and feeble, and I feel that one 
foot is lifted to step into the world beyond. I have 
stood all my life as a peacemaker between your people 
and my own, trying to soothe the prejudices of the 
two races against each other. 

''In conclusion, permit me to say I rejoice with the 
joy of childhood that you have granted a 'son of the 
forest' a right to speak to you; and the prayer of my 
heart shall ever be so long as I live, that the Great 
Spirit will bless you and your children, and that the 
generations yet unborn may learn to know that we are 
all brothers, and that God is the Father of all." 

At Liberty, Indiana, in 1898, Pokagon made an ad- 
dress to the society called the Order of Red Men, in 



io8 INDIAN SKETCHES 

which he expressed his pleasure that some of the tradi- 
tions of his race were being remembered in their cere- 
monies : 

''The Red Men's Order highly compliments our race 
by dividing time into suns and moons, as our fore- 
fathers did, all of which goes to show that they under- 
stood the fact that we lived close to the Great Heart 
of Nature, and that we believed in one Great Spirit 
who created all things, and governs all. Hence that 
noble motto, born with our race — Freedom, Friend- 
ship, and Charity — was wisely chosen for their guid- 
ing star. Yes, Freedom, Friendship, Charity! 
Those heaven-born principles shall never, never die ! 
It was by those principles our fathers cared for the 
orphans and the unfortunate, without books, without 
laws, without judges ; for the Great Spirit had written 
His laws in their hearts, which they obeyed. 

''Our camp-fires have all gone out. Our Council 
fires blaze no more. Our wigwams and they who built 
them, with their children, have forever disappeared 
from this beautiful land, and I alone of all the chiefs 
am permitted to behold it again. 

"But what a change ! Where cabins and wigwams 
once stood, now stand churches, schoolhouses, cottages 
and castles ; and where we walked or rode in single 
file along our winding trails, now locomotives scream 
like some beast of prey, rushing along their iron tracks, 
drawing after them long rows of palaces with travel- 
lers therein, outstripping the flight of eagles in their 
course! As I behold this mighty change all over the 
face of this broad land, I feel about my heart as I did 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 109 

in childhood when I saw for the first time the rainbow 
spanning the cloud of the departing storm." 

Perhaps the aged Chief did not know the story of 
King Arthur in the poetry of Tennyson, but in his 
generous appreciation of the race that had conquered 
his, he was speaking like the epic hero, after his de- 
feat and the loss of all that he had loved. This was his 
beautiful Indian way of saying: 

The old order changeth, giving place to new, 
And God fulfils himself in many ways. 

He had seen beauty and goodness in the forest life of 
his people, but his generous heart enabled him to see 
it in the white man's new civilization, too, and to be 
glad that the new order was so beautiful and good. 

In 1898 Pokagon's last portrait was painted, at the 
request of the Field Museum, by E. A. Burbank. It 
shows us the old chief's face weakened by age, but full 
of character, radiant with interest, direct and noble in 
its gaze, gentle and friendly in its general expression. 
The artist tells that these were the notable qualities in 
Pokagon's character, that he was a very interesting 
sitter to talk to, and able to speak a beautiful English. 
Sometimes he would be heard talking to the birds near 
his home, and he claimed that his bird friends came 
every day and talked to him — perhaps he had learned 
their language from Lonidaw. Sometimes he talked 
about his Indian people, and sometimes about the large 
tract of land near the Chicago river, that had been set 
aside by the Government for his band, but had never 
been given them or paid for. The importance of arti- 



no 



INDIAN SKETCHES 




CHIEF SIMON POKAGON 

Last Portrait, painted by E, A. Burbank in 1898 

''One of the most kind and tender-hearted men I have ever 
known." — Burbank 

cles that he had written was now recognized, and Mr. 
Burbank urged him to give himself no peace until he 
had finished his writing. Unfortunately, much of his 
material and all of his precious documents from his 
father's time were destroyed in a fire that burned down 
his house. 



CHIEF SIMON POKAGON iii 

The one good thing that grew out of that misfor- 
tune was that it offered an opportunity for friends to 
do him the kindness of building him a house as a gift. 
His good friend, J. C. Engle, of Hartford, Michigan, 
who had helped him with legal advice for forty years 
without accepting payment, helped him now in this, 
and also in the still greater project of publishing the 
story he had written, 0-gi-maw-kwe Mit-i-gwa-ki, 
Queen of the Woods, which shows his ideals, if not 
always the exact facts of his life. In this beautiful 
Indian idyl, he left us a revelation of the depths of 
the Indian heart. Just before it had issued from the 
press, after a very short illness, the old chief died, 
on January 2y, 1899. The true friendship and the 
appreciation that he had met with from some of the 
white men must have done much to heal the wound of 
the injustice done by others to his tribe. An attempt 
was made to have his body taken to Chicago and in- 
terred with public honor in Graceland Cemetery, near 
the grave of John Kinzie, the first white resident. 
Perhaps it is most fit that his quiet grave should lie, 
as it does, far from the great city, amid the fields of 
the retreat in Michigan, near the sand-dunes of South 
Haven and the shores of Lake Sag-i-a-gan. 



APPENDIX 

PORTION OF A TREATY WITH THE 
POTOWATOMIES 

[concluded OCTOBER 27, 1832 — RATIFIED JANUARY 21, 1833.] 

Articles of a treaty, made and concluded on the Tippecanoe river, 
in the State of Indiana, on the twenty-seventh day of October, 
in the year of our Lord eighteen hundred and thirty-tivo, be- 
tween Jonathan Jennings, John IV. Davis, and Marks Crume, 
commissioners on the part of the United States, and the chiefs 
and ivarriors of^ the Potowatomies, of the State of Indiana and 
Michigan Territory. 

Art. I. The chiefs and warriors aforesaid cede to the United 
States their title and interest to lands in the States of Indiana 
and Illinois, and in the Territory of Michigan south of Grand 
river. 

Art. 2. From the cession aforesaid, the following reservations 
are made, to wit : The reservation at Po-ca-gan's village for his 
band, and a reservation for such of the Potowatomies as are 
resident at the village of Notta-we-sipa, agreeably to the treaties 
of the nineteenth of September, eighteen hundred and twenty- 
seven, and twentieth of September, 1828. 

The United States agree to appropriate, for the purposes of 
educating Indian youths, the annual sum of two thousand dollars, 
as long as the Congress of the United States may think proper, to 
be expended as the President may direct. 

This treaty shall take effect and be obligatory on the contracting 
parties, as soon as the same shall have been ratified by the Presi- 
dent of the United States, by and with the advice and consent of 
the Senate. 

In testimony whereof, the said Jonathan Jennings, John W. 
Davis, and Marks Crume, commissioners as aforesaid, and 
the chiefs, head men, and warribrs of the Potowatomies, have 
hereunto set their hands at Tippecanoe, on the twenty-seventh 
day of October, in the year eighteen hundred and thirty-two. 

112 



APPENDIX 



II 



Jonathan Jennings, Marks Crume. 

J. W. Davis, 

To-pe-ne-be, his x mark, 
Po-ka-gou, his x mark, 
Sa-ga-nah, his x mark, 
Pe-che-co, his x mark, 
We-is-saw, his x mark, 
Che-shaw-gun, his x mark, 
Ghe-bause, his x mark, 
0-saw-o-wah-co-ne-ah, his x 

mark, 
Mah-gah-guk, his x mark, 
Sa-gue-na-nah, his x mark, 
Louison Burnet, his x mark, 
Shaw-wah-nuk-wiik, his x mark, 
Mix-sau-bah, his x mark, 
Ne-wah-ko-to, his x mark, 
Che-bah, his x mark, 
Wah-cose, his x mark. 



Mo-nis, his x mark, 
O-go-maw-be-tuk, his x mark, 
Kaw-kaw-ke-moke, his x mark, 
Ke-swah-bay, his x mark, 
Win-keese, his x mark. 
To-posh, his X mark, 
Kawk-moc-a-sin, his x mark, 
Sa-maw-cah, his x mark, 
Ko-mack, his x mark, 
O-guon-cote, his x mark, 
Quis-sin, his x mark, 
Choti-a-ma-see, his x mark, 
Pat-e-ca-sha, his x mark, 
Pe-nah-seh, his x mark, 
Mix-e-nee, his x mark, 
Pe-na-shee, his x mark, 
So-wah-quen, his x mark, 



****** 
****** 
****** 

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